We are
a tiny bit obsessed with penguins. Over the years we have built up a large
collection of penguinalia. We have over 100 cuddly (plush) penguins, many
tee-shirts, mugs, various ornaments, jewellery, underwear, ties, etc. Barbara's
car is decked out with Adelie penguins all round and even our bathroom
is tiled with specially painted penguin tiles!
To help others with similar afflictions to get hold of penguin merchandise
we list on this page the best places we have found that regularly stock
penguin goods.
First we give details of some shops and some mail
order services.
Then we give information on the best way to get various goodies and
recommend some really good items that we own.
If you know of any other places where good penguin items can be found
please tell us and we will
add the information to this page.
Shops
Next Stop South Pole
must be the very best penguin shop anywhere. They
only sell penguin stuff. There is a store in Baltimore and a mail order
service based in New York. NSSP also runs an internet shop - see
below.
***WARNING*** Enter with caution - you may spend more than you
intend!
Next Stop stocks everything you could possibly imagine and then
more - if it is penguin related then they will have it.
Best buys: 'The Penguins' tee shirt - all the species on one shirt!
- Penguin Calendars - Bumper Stickers - Mugs ....
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Harbour Place
Baltimore
MD 21202
USA
Phone: (410) 659 0860
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The International Antarctic Centre at Christchurch Airport, New Zealand.
The gift shop stocks a large range of clothes, jewellery, cuddly toys,
books, videos, and lots more.
Best buys: Rookery print clothes - the leggings are a must for any
well dressed girl! Good range of jewellery.
Other Stores
-
The Antarctic Connection at 29 Salamanca Place Hobart. We have not visited
this store ourselves, but we have used their mail order service - see below.
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Sea World Gift Stores - San Diego, CA. San Antonio, TX. Aurora, OH. and
Orlando, FL. - all in USA - Best buys: cuddly Emperor penguin chicks -
bumper stickers, etc.
-
Arkadia, Edinburgh Zoo Gift Store, Scotland. Best buys: Edinburgh Zoo penguin
tee shirts with lots of lovely line drawings of kings, macaronis, rockhoppers
and gentoos. - Cuddly King chicks, these are made specially for the shop
- and ring binders and folders with a wonderful penguin print design (NSSP
sell wrapping paper and cards in this design but not the binders and folders).
-
The Nature Company - stores throughout USA and Canada. Best buy Blow up
full size emperor penguin.
Mail Order and Online Catalogues
Obviously first up are Next
Stop South Pole (mail order address Penguin Place 202 Water Street,
Brooklyn, NY) and The
International Antarctic Centre. Both of these have web sites where
you can order a catalogue.
There are two web sites calling themselves "The Antarctic Connection".
One is based in Australia at http://www.southcom.com.au/~salmax
- they have an on line catalogue which includes an excellent Adelie print
tee shirt.
The other is based in the USA, their website is at http://www.antarcticconnection.com
- they have an online catalogue with lots of goodies including posters,
maps, and some clothes.
The World
of Boxes has a wonderful wooden box decorated with penguins.
Best of the rest
-
The Gould League of Victoria have a good poster (US$20) and a Penguin Sticker
Book (US$5) available by mail order from Gould League, Genoa Street, Moorabbin,
3189, Australia. (tel +61 3 9532 0909, fax +61 3 9532 2860)
-
Sea World in San Diego say they will do mail order, but don't publish a
catalogue - contact Merchandising Department, Sea World, Mission Bay, San
Diego, CA, USA
-
RSPB publish mail order catalogues twice a year. These often have good
penguin stuff - watch out for Christmas cards and the occasional tee-shirt.
Contact RSPB, Sandy, Beds. UK
-
Whales and Things sometimes have really good penguin clothes and other
stuff (such as mouse mats, etc.). They are a US company but they will ship
internationally. Their addresses are: 47 Industrial Park Road; Centerbrook,
CT 06409 or P.O. Box 388; Centerbrook, CT 06409-0388. Telephone and fax
numbers from inside the USA are: tel 1-800 234-1022 fax 1-860-767-4381
we don't have numbers for callers from outside the USA.
Clothes
Tee Shirts
Many shops sell tee shirts. The best we know you can get come from Next
Stop South Pole and International Antarctic Centre. Try them first. Sea
World usually have a good stock, but they do all have Sea World logos plastered
all over them. Many zoos sell penguin tee shirts.
Shorts
We once bought shorts from the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) by mail
order. Otherwise the only shorts we have seen are available from the International
Antarctic Centre.
Leggings
The rookery print leggings available from the International Antarctic Centre
are so good they deserve a special mention. Barbara wouldn't be seen in
anything else!
Socks
Penguin socks become popular around Christmas. Try Sock Shop, or any department
store. As usual Next Stop South Pole and International Antarctic Centre
have good supplies.
Ties
Peter started a collection of penguin ties just about six years ago, the
total is now over 140 different ties and rising. The best places to pick
up penguin ties are the shopping malls at international airports. Tie Rack
have over the years stocked several designs and usually have one or two
in stock. Salvatore Ferragamo seem to bring out a new penguin design each
year.
Nightshirts
Barbara has now started her own collection, of night shirts and pyjamas.
These can be found in many stores around Christmas time. It is worth
looking not only in department stores, but also in any womens wear shops.
So far Barbara has collected about 50 nightshirts!
Underwear
Next Stop South Pole and International Antarctic Centre both offer men's
underwear, International Antarctic Centre has women's as well. Sometimes
you can find silk boxer shorts in Tie Rack - these have to be seen to be
believed. Marks and Spencer have had penguin underwear and nightdresses
at Christmas time for the last couple of years, as have had several department
stores.
Books
There are many good penguin books available from good bookshops. See our
bibliography page for details.
Videos
The best videos we know of are the Life in the Freezer series made by the
BBC and the Wild South Collection available from the International Antarctic
Centre.
Jewellery
All sorts of jewellery can be found. Liberty of London make some lovely
cufflinks and tie pins for men. Next Stop South Pole has some really good
rings for women and the International Antarctic Centre sells some really
good pendants and brooches (USA - pins). Many high street jewellery shops
sell penguin charms and bracelets etc.
Posters, Calendars and Cards
As usual the best place is Next Stop South Pole, they stock a good range
of posters and cards and always have several penguin calendars. However,
we usually manage to find a good range in high street shops around Christmas
time. The best range of calendars we have found is at 'The World's Biggest
Book Shop' in Toronto, Canada. Hedgehog House, PO Box 33-152, Christchurch,
NZ (tel/fax +64 3 332 8790) have a good selection of cards and publish
a really good Antarctic Calendar each year. They also do a good desk diary.
Jonathan Chester
has made two excellent posters - Penguins of the World, which shows all
17 species with a quick summary of their sizes and weights and Penguins
of the Antarctic, which includes a good description of the behaviour of
the Emperor, Adelie, Gentoo and Chinstrap penguins with lots of very good
photos. The posters are available from - the Publishers: Celestial Arts
- PO Box 7123 Berkeley California 94707 1 800 8412665 fax 1 510 559162.
Jonathan has also produced a book of some of his postcards - all very good
photos taken in Antarctica, these are available from the same publishers
or over the internet from Jonathan's
site.
Cuddly Penguins (Plush in the USA!)
There are so many cuddly toys on the market these days that we restrict
ourselves to buying only good accurate ones. Sea World sell good banded
penguins (almost life size) which are good for taking to zoos and letting
people think you've stolen a real penguin! Next Stop have some good crested
penguins and International Antarctic Centre good Kings, Emperors and Adelies.
The very best we have ever seen was in the gift shop in London Zoo - a
perfect life size long crested Rockhopper, very expensive but a real must
have (ours is called Moseley - if you are a real penguin freak you should
know why!).
Sculptures and Ornaments
There is a vast choice out there, every time we go shopping anywhere in
the world we seem to see something. The problem is that so much is really
rather poor quality, or badly posed and unlife-like. Highbank Ceramics
of Edinburgh (available from most good china stores) make some very life-like
ceramic penguins - the best is the diving chinstrap.
Miscellany
What else is there? There seems to be an ever increasing amount of "penguinalia"
available in the high street these days. Our favourites include waddling
and swimming penguins - from many zoo shops, NSSP, etc. Penguin Garden
Furniture (easy to make your own seats etc.). Table mats (International
Antarctic Centre), Nightshirt (NSSP), and so on. Let us know your ideas
and where to get them and we'll include them here.
Guide to Pete & Barb's Penguin Pages
Front Page and Introduction
· Descriptions of the Penguins
· Detailed Species Notes ·
Breeding Behaviour · Common
questions · Penguin Goodies ·
Penguin Bibliography · Good
Penguin Guide · Photo Index ·
Links to other penguin sites ·
'Penguin-balls' · Endangered
Penguins ·
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