The “Mattel 80th Anniversary Exhibition” has opened its doors at the Istanbul Toy Museum.

Mattel’s 80th anniversary and the Istanbul Toy Museum’s 20th anniversary are being celebrated with a special exhibition that reflects the cultural heritage of play.

ISTANBUL – Mattel’s 80th anniversary and the Istanbul Toy Museum’s 20th anniversary are being celebrated with a special exhibition that reflects the cultural heritage of play. Founded in 1945, Mattel has for 80 years positioned play as a universal language that strengthens imagination, creativity and the bond between generations. The company has now crowned the partnership it began with the Istanbul Toy Museum on World Play Day with the “Mattel 80th Anniversary Exhibition”.

The opening of the exhibition on 25 December was hosted by Sunay Akın, founder of the Istanbul Toy Museum, and actor and writer Gupse Özay. The two met the guests and shared the excitement of this special project. Highlighting the way play strengthens the bond between generations, the exhibition stands out as an important reflection of Mattel’s corporate social responsibility vision.

At the opening, Sunay Akın and Gupse Özay shared their thoughts on the heritage that play has carried over the years and emphasised that the exhibition presents our shared memory to visitors from a new perspective.

Iconic toys telling the story of 80 years of Mattel heritage: alongside works selected from the Istanbul Toy Museum archive, the exhibition offers a wide selection of archival toys brought from abroad and pieces from the brand’s current collections.

The selection includes examples of the first Barbie dolls produced in 1959, the doll of Tippi Hedren’s character from Alfred Hitchcock’s “The Birds”, the Barbie series inspired by Vincent van Gogh’s Sunflowers and Claude Monet’s Water Lilies, one of the first toy time machines made in 1968, and the first toys of Sesame Street, the series that entered our lives in 1969 and that all children watched with great interest. Regarded as milestones in Mattel’s design, production and play culture, these pieces shed light on the brand’s 80-year journey.

This special collection of toys from iconic brands such as Barbie, Hot Wheels, UNO, Monster High and Fisher-Price shows, from an enjoyable perspective, how Mattel has become an inseparable part of both daily life and popular culture for more than eight decades.

Through its corporate social responsibility approach, Mattel sees play not only as a form of entertainment but as a basic right for the healthy development of children. In line with this, on 11 June, International Day of Play, the brand supported equal access to play by opening the museum to children free of charge as part of the partnership it started with the Istanbul Toy Museum.

As a continuation of this vision, the “Mattel 80th Anniversary Exhibition” will be open free of charge to visitors aged 0–18 on the weekend of 27–28 December. With this, Mattel aims to increase children’s participation in cultural and artistic activities and to strengthen the inclusiveness of learning through play.

On a global scale, Mattel acts with the responsibility of being a good corporate citizen and continues to actively support the communities where we live, work and play. With its “Play it Forward” approach, which aims to protect every child’s right to play, the brand increases its in-kind donations through its people, products and partnerships, designs volunteering programmes and works with non-governmental organisations that contribute to children’s development.

Mattel’s global philanthropy is shaped under its Play it Forward initiatives, which aim to bring children together with the transformative power of play and to help future generations reach their potential.

A journey enriched with workshops and film screenings awaits visitors

The exhibition comes with a programme of creative workshops for children and Mattel-licensed film screenings in the Museum’s theatre area. Visitors have the chance to discover the cultural impact that play creates through both objects and storytelling. The exhibition can be visited until the end of January.