A couple of Christmases ago my daughter received some Slyvanian Families rabbits, furniture and a house, the “Midori no Oka no Sutekina Ie,” which roughly translates as the “Posh Green Hill House” and is available on Amazon as the Deluxe Village House
My fond expectation was that this would provide hours of creative domestic fun, but my daughter’s chief enjoyment was found to be in piling up all the furniture and creatures higgledy-piggledy inside the house and then watching my “horrified” reaction at the vision of chaos that she had so adeptly created.
Sylvanian Families is a range of 2″-3″ anthropomorphic plush animal figures created by a Japanese company called Epoch in the mid 1980s. I only recently found out that they are called “Calico Critters” in the USA. I mean, I had heard the term “Calico Critters” but had no idea it was another name for Sylvanian Families.
Sylvanian Families – aka Calico Critters – are toy animal families such as rabbits, dogs, cats, mice, and so on, although in Japan the rabbit family predominates (er, perhaps because they breed like bunnies?).
Every aspiring bunny needs a house.
Every aspiring bunny family needs a home and the “Deluxe Village House” is a good size for the upwardly mobile rabbit, or “usagi” as rabbits are called In Japanese.
Inside the house you will find everything that a Calico Critters family needs for a comfortable home. It is a spacious three-story residence with dormer windows in the roof. The house is 18 inches high, 18 inches wide, and 16 inches deep. Above the porch, French doors open on to a balcony. The back of the house is open, revealing a spiral staircase and white balustrades. A ladder is provided to take the residents up to the third floor dormer bedroom.
Kitchen, bedroom and living room sets come as multiple accessories and are very detailed; no aspect of domestic life is missing from the complete range of accessories, such as fridges fully stocked with (removable) items of food and drink.
A couple of things I like about Sylvanian Families playhouses is that they are lightweight and a good size for setting up on a table or in the playroom. You can store your Calico Critters right inside and easily store the house on a shelf when it is not in use. Beware though; if your child gets hooked on Sylvanian Families, there is no end to the accessories that you can buy!
In my case, as a bloke, I prefer to play with Lego and encourage my daughter to do so too, so I really don’t mind about the way she so horribly abused her Sylvanian Families family!
David Hurley
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