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The Peggy Nisbet company was known primarily for its ranges of "costume dolls".
Focusing on things like traditional national costumes and UK Royalty,with a reputation for accuracy and authenticity. And pitched more at the collector's market than the very young.
But,at the beginning of the 1970's,it also started to produce some small ranges of soft toys,specifically for children.
And this included 4 Herbs examples.
Listed in the 1971 catalogue under the category heading of "BBC Watch With Mother characters" ....
"Parsley" .... "Dill" .... "Sage" .... and a "Mini-Parsley".
Also accompanied by 4 others from "The Pogles" ( Pogles wiki )
The Herbs and The Adventures of Parsley
On this page ..... Some early 1970's soft toys by Peggy Nisbet.
The Parsley and Dill examples are both about 11" high x 6" wide.
And are made from a printed and stitched cotton-like fabric stretched over a soft filling.
They did well enough to still be featured in the 1973 edition -minus "Mini-Parsley",which had disappeared.
And as I've not been able to find the previous year's edition I don't know if it was discontinued in 72 or 73.
In fact I've yet to see any evidence of what it actually looked like.
And the other 3 aren't exactly "ubiquitous" either.Because the above photos are the only ones of those I've ever seen too -despite their obvious advantage of being catalogued for longer ie. at least 3 years.
So it's probably a bit surprising that the Dill one only fetched £89 when it sold on ebay in Sept.2015.
And whilst that could be due to all sorts of things,I cant help thinking that if Nisbet collectors valued the soft toys as much as the custom dolls then it would've done better.
But maybe they do and that's simply what it was worth. Who knows ?
In the meantime,the hunt continues for a 1st sighting of the elusive "Mini-Parsley".
As does some definitive confirmation about when the range officially started and finished.
Unfortunately,the catalogues offer very little help ...
In fact it's a bit of a misnomer to call them "catalogues" at all really.As they were basically just lists of product names, with a few token b&w photos ( at least for the years that we're interested in.)
And the custom dolls were not only the sole beneficiaries of those pics,but also the only ones to be given individual reference numbers.
Leaving you with the distinct impression that those early soft toys were just a half-hearted,toe-in-the-water experiment.
Which usually doesn't bode well for any product,whatever the line of business.
But let's end on a slightly more upbeat note.
And,arguably,saving the best till last too,with a look at their interpretation of Sage .... photo courtesy of Tony Clark.
