A character with a seat in the circle
In a playgroup or kindergarten, a hand puppet soon becomes part of the group. It greets everyone when the day starts and wants to know who went for a walk in the woods at the weekend. When someone has a birthday, it is the first to congratulate them.
A hand puppet can also insist on speaking just one language. In a family that speaks English at home, a character that only understands Standard German gives a child a reason to try a few words. A second one that only knows French brings another of Switzerland's national languages into play.
A hand puppet only looks as if it is talking when its mouth or beak moves with your hand. Practically every Living Puppets character has a movable mouth or beak, as do most Folkmanis animals and roughly half of the range from The Puppet Company.
Animals from woods, meadows and Alpine pastures
For a kindergarten group learning about the animals that live nearby, Folkmanis and Hansa Creation offer plenty of true-to-life hand puppets. Both brands make a fox, hedgehog, squirrel and beaver; Folkmanis adds a badger, Hansa Creation a marmot.
Folkmanis also makes the Valais Blacknose Sheep, a breed from the canton of Valais. With its movable mouth, it can tell the group who it met on the way up to the Alpine pasture. Most Hansa Creation animals let you work the head and front legs; the fox in this range also has a movable mouth.
Stage puppets, small hands and a few surprises
Every Hansa Creation hand puppet is built as a stage puppet, and so are some Folkmanis characters. They are worked from below, the way you would hold a Punch and Judy puppet, so they can rise above the edge of a puppet booth. Without a booth, you play them like any other hand puppet, or let them pop up from behind the sofa.
For children's hands, Folkmanis makes small stage puppets, including a little turtle, a little mole and a little lop-eared rabbit. For any other model, just ask us how well it suits a child's hand.
A few characters have a surprise in store. The Folkmanis snail withdraws into its shell, the Folkmanis hedgehog curls up into a ball, and Gregor the dragon from Living Puppets hides inside his egg. A number of hand puppets by The Puppet Company make a sound, such as the crow and the sock monsters.
Four brands side by side
- Folkmanis: lifelike animals and mythical creatures at the higher end of the price scale. What you can work depends on the character: often the mouth or beak, sometimes only the head, wings or front legs, and quite often a combination of these.
- Hansa Creation: true-to-life animals, mostly with fur, also in the higher price bracket, all of them built as stage puppets. Head and front legs can be worked on most of them.
- Living Puppets: monsters, people and animals full of personality, nearly every one with a mouth or beak you can work. On many of the human characters the hands can be worked as well, and some of these characters can be fully undressed and put into new clothes.
- The Puppet Company: the affordable Puppet Buddies animal series with a head that moves, plus sock monsters and soft baby hand puppets for the very youngest.
In care homes, therapy and as a present
Activity coordinators in care homes often bring along an animal hand puppet, such as a cat, a dog or a sheep. It may remind residents of a pet they once had or of life on a farm. Speech and language therapists and special needs teachers like to use a hand puppet for short conversations and exercises.
Many godparents choose their godchild's favourite animal as a birthday or Christmas present. For a toddler, the soft baby hand puppets by The Puppet Company are a good start, with a parent or grandparent doing the playing at first.
Finding the right character
- What should it do? For talking and singing, choose a movable mouth or beak. If you want it to wave, point or hold something, look for front legs or hands that move. For nodding and looking around, a head that moves is enough.
- Who will play? The small Folkmanis stage puppets, for example, are designed for children's hands.
- One character or several? For a group, several hand puppets from one series work well together, the Puppet Buddies for example.
- Budget: The Puppet Buddies and the baby hand puppets cost the least, most Living Puppets characters sit in the middle, and Folkmanis and Hansa Creation are at the upper end.
- Ordering from Switzerland: We dispatch from Germany, and delivery to Switzerland takes 2–6 business days. Prices exclude German VAT and basic customs clearance is included in the shipping cost; any Swiss import VAT is paid on delivery. Invoice payment is also possible for kindergartens, schools, care homes and medical facilities in Switzerland. Register and send us a message; after a review, we will enable it for your customer account.