A toy or plaything is an object that is used primarily to provide entertainment. Simple examples include toy blocks, board games, and dolls. Toys are often designed for use by children, although many are designed specifically for adults and pets. Toys can provide utilitarian benefits, including physical exercise, cultural awareness, or academic education. Additionally, utilitarian objects, especially those which are no longer needed for their original purpose, can be used as toys. Examples include children building a fort with empty cereal boxes and tissue paper spools, or a toddler playing with a broken TV remote control. The term "toy" can also be used to refer to utilitarian objects purchased for enjoyment rather than need, or for expensive necessities for which a large fraction of the cost represents its ability to provide enjoyment to the owner, such as luxury cars, high-end motorcycles, gaming computers, and flagship smartphones.
Mechelen is a city and municipality in the province of Antwerp in the Flemish Region of Belgium. The municipality comprises the city of Mechelen proper, some quarters at its outskirts, the hamlets of Nekkerspoel (adjacent) and Battel, as well as the villages of Walem, Heffen, Leest, Hombeek, and Muizen. The Dyle flows through the city, hence it is often referred to as the Dijlestad.
Educational entertainment is media designed to educate through entertainment. The term was used as early as 1954 by Walt Disney. Most often it includes content intended to teach but has incidental entertainment value. It has been used by academia, corporations, governments, and other entities in various countries to disseminate information in classrooms and/or via television, radio, and other media to influence viewers' opinions and behaviors.
St. Rumbold's Cathedral is the Roman Catholic metropolitan archiepiscopal cathedral in Mechelen, Belgium, dedicated to Saint Rumbold, Christian missionary and martyr who had founded an abbey nearby. His remains are rumoured to be buried inside the cathedral. State-of-the-art examination of the relics honoured as Saint Rumbold's and kept in a shrine in the retro-choir, showed a life span of about 40 years and a death date between 580 and 655, while tradition had claimed 775 AD.
Antwerp Zoo is a zoo in the centre of Antwerp, Belgium, located next to the Antwerpen-Centraal railway station. It is the oldest animal park in the country, and one of the oldest in the world, established on 21 July 1843.
Jan Snellinck or Jan Snellinck (I) was a Flemish painter, draughtsman and designer of tapestries, prints and frescoes. He is known for his large altarpieces and was also recognized as a leading battle painter in his time. Snellinck was active as an art dealer and art collector.
The Royal Carillon School "Jef Denyn" is a music school in Mechelen, Belgium, that specializes in the carillon. It is the first and largest carillon school in the world. The Belgian government defines it as an "International Higher Institute for the Carillon Arts under the High Protection of Her Majesty Queen Fabiola". The school has trained many of the foremost carillonneurs of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries and houses a rich archive and library.
Hans Bol or Jan Bol, was a Flemish painter, print artist, miniaturist painter and draftsman. He is known for his landscapes, allegorical and biblical scenes, and genre paintings executed in a late Northern Mannerist style.
Nekkerspoel is a neighbourhood of Mechelen, Belgium, immediately east of the city. The name means pool of one or more Nekkers or water demons. and it is presumed that in earlier centuries locals taking a shortcut through the marshlands, of which the Mechels Broek is a surviving remnant, may have strayed off safer pathways and lost their lives. In 1904, remnants dating from the La Tène era of a settlement of several wooden houses and an 8.4 metre long oaken dugout canoe were found at a depth of 5 metres.
The Mechelen transit camp, officially SS-Sammellager Mecheln in German, also known as the Dossin barracks, was a detention and deportation camp established in a former army barracks at Mechelen in German-occupied Belgium. It served as a point to gather Belgian Jews and Romani ahead of their deportation to concentration and extermination camps in Eastern Europe during the Holocaust.
A toy museum is a museum for toys. They typically showcase toys from a particular culture or period with their history. These are distinct from children's museums, which are museums for children, and are often interactive – toy museums may be aimed at children or adults, and may have interactive exhibits or be exclusively for display.
Stevanne Auerbach also known as Dr. Toy, is an American educator, child development expert, writer and toyologist. She is best known for being an expert on as well as advocate of toys, play and the toy industry. After more than fifty years in the field of toys, she was named one of seven "Wonder Women of Toys" by Women In Toys and Playthings magazine. She is a frequent guest speaker on toys and play for all ages at industry, professional, parent and public meetings. She makes several public appearances each year to promote her causes, which include building greater awareness in parents of their essential role as play tutors for their children, the educational, and many other benefits of play, and to encourage the enhancement of play value and high standards of quality, safety, and protection of creativity in toys within the toy industry.
Cornelis Huysmans was a Flemish landscape painter who was active in Antwerp, Brussels and Mechelen. Huysmans held a foremost position in Flemish landscape painting in the late 17th and early 18th century and was particularly known for his pseudo-Italianate landscapes with mountains in the background, which show the influence of Nicolas Poussin and Jacques d'Arthois.
The Toy Shop is an exhibit building at Shelburne Museum, which is located in Shelburne, Vermont. Toy Shop houses 19th- and early 20th-century playthings, including miniature transportation toys, penny banks, and music boxes.
Saint Petersburg Toy Museum is a non-state cultural establishment.
The Kazerne Dossin Holocaust memorial is the only part of the Kazerne Dossin: Memorial, Museum and Documentation Centre on Holocaust and Human Rights established within the former Mechelen transit camp of World War II, from which, in German-occupied Belgium, arrested Jews and Romani were sent to concentration camps. The aforementioned museum and documentation centre are housed in a new purpose-built complex across the public square.
The Strong is an interactive, collections-based educational institution in Rochester, New York, United States, devoted to the study and exploration of play. It carries out this mission through six programmatic arms called "Play Partners":
Willem Jacob Herreyns was a Flemish painter of history subjects and portraits. He is regarded as one of the last painters in the tradition of the Flemish Baroque and the last follower of Peter Paul Rubens.
The Spanish Fury at Mechelen was an event in the Eighty Years' War on October 2, 1572 in which the city of Mechelen was conquered by the Spanish army and brutally sacked.
The Historic Toy Museum in Freinsheim in Germany is a private collection of old toys.
