A tiny museum packs a punch of nostalgia with its carefully curated collection, says Angilee Shah

Imagine a rainy Saturday afternoon spent indoors, surrounded by The Monkees, The Boy Wonder and Popeye with his corncob pipe as The Jungle Book’s ‘The Bear Necessities’ plays jauntily in the background. It’s a fantasy a toy junkie or child-at-heart can appreciate, and a reality enjoyed at the Mint Museum of Toys. 

The Mint – entering its third year of operation – is an ever-evolving celebration of childhood, both real and re-imagined. The five-storey building houses more than a century’s worth of toys and memorabilia, ranging from Disney favourites to tin figurines from the mid-1800s, and even rare collectables that museum curators believe to be the only ones of their kind in the world. It’s a treasure trove of an estimated 50,000 relics worth somewhere between S$5 million and $10 million – and it’s all one man’s toy chest on display. 

‘This is his collection,’ Mint curator Richard Tan says of 58-year-old owner Chang Yang Fa, who’s been amassing these trinkets for more than 30 years. The man behind the Mint prefers to keep a low profile; Chang, who also owns a consulting firm, doesn’t like talking to reporters or having his photo taken. 

But sifting through Chang’s toys is like getting to know the owner himself. If his collection says anything, it’s that he’s a man of eclectic tastes with a love of nostalgia. At the museum you can find everything from handmade dolls from Shanghai to Matchbox cars and Beatles wigs from the 1960s. Items showcased are typically one-of-a-kind, in mint (obviously) condition and often come with their original packaging. This is one of two reasons the museum is called the Mint; the other, so befitting of a Singaporean collector, is to incorporate the acronym ‘Moment of Imagination and Nostalgia with Toys’. 

It’s hard not to get caught up in the past at the quirky museum, which also boasts a café, gift shop and restaurant. When you buy your ticket, the cashier will direct you to start exploring on the top floor (full of toy robots and Star Wars posters) and work your way down to the second floor (which houses the oldest toys in the museum). On the third floor, you can find Mickey Mouse figurines: original Disney products, ugly knock-offs from Britain and one 1930s doll with Walt Disney’s signature on the underside of Mickey’s shoe. At the bottom of the display shelf sits a Mickey doll with his nose glued back on, which belonged to one of Chang’s three children; it’s a rare example of a non-mintcondition item. ‘Some of our happiest moments in childhood were playing with toys,’ says Tan. The 50- year-old with silver hair and quick speech recounts his own youth, when he would save his spare change to buy Matchbox cars at 70 cents apiece. The toys he analyses and restores are of the kind he only dreamed about playing with as a child. 



In the Mint’s offsite office, among cardboard boxes and stacks of posters and toy packaging brought from a large warehouse – ‘I can’t tell you where it is for security reasons’ – Tan is excited like, well, a kid in a toy store. 

‘I don’t know what is in all of these boxes,’ he says with a laugh, motioning to the many unopened stacks. The museum will rotate its collection about every three months as more of Chang’s treasures are unpacked and understood. Whatever the boxes hold, Tan is adamant that toys from the pre-plastic age evoke something that kids today are severely missing. ‘Kids look at screens and push buttons,’ he laments. ‘They do not physically move their own toys.’ 

He holds up a badly damaged 5cmtall Charlie Chaplin figurine, which will probably never make it to the museum shelves. Charlie’s right arm is dangling from its socket, but Tan examines it with the trained eye of a master craftsman – he used to work as a jeweller. He demonstrates on the table how a child can move Charlie for himself and his joy is palpable. 

‘See how light it is?’ he says. Light and carefree, like a childhood long gone.