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Toy Fair Day 2: Four Wheeled Wonders

There is always an abundance of toy cars at Toy Fair, but finding 1/24 scale vehicles is a little trickier...and finding truly unique ways of executing them is a particularly rare find. It seems like everyone was on their A-game this year, though, because there were quite a few options that I would love to add to my collection.

Candylab


One of the most surprising cool finds at Toy Fair was Candylab Toys. Founded by artist Vlad Dragusin, Candylab makes a series of high quality wooden cars inspired by the classic American muscle car era. The artists at Candylab collect reference material for each car, and distill that material down to a simplified essence that then gets recreated in wood and painted a high-gloss basecoat/clearcoat that recalls the colors of the time. A set of ABS wheels wearing food-grade rubber tires finishes each car, and the result is a unique piece that still immediately suggests legendary names like "Charger,""Barracuda," and "Fury."

Young Toys


Switching gears from classic wood to futuristic sci-fi, Young Toys was on hand with their Tobot series. Founded in 1980, Young Toys was one of the few South Korean companies that actually purchased a license to produce toys from Tomy, Hasbro, Playmobil, and Bandai (rather than the more common practice of simply producing knock-off toys). Tobot, their first original robot toy, launched at the end of 2009 with an animation series the following year. This was the first time that I'd seen them in person, and was impressed by how good they look in both modes. Their robot modes are clever and well articulated, and their alt modes are a combination of stock and customized Kias, sized perfectly to go with 1/24 scale series like Hasbro/Takara's Alternators/Binaltech.

Carrera


On more familiar ground, Carrera only has one all-new 1/24 mold for 2014—the Ferrari 458 Italia GT3—but they have several new decos on deck, including the above Ferrari 512S Berlinetta. They are also continuing and expanding their Mario Kart and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles lines...which are labelled 1/43 to work with their 1/43 scale tracks, but going by the figure sizes they are a lot closer to 1/24. I will be reviewing some of Carrera's previous Mario Kart on the site in the next few weeks.

NKOK


NKOK had pre-production samples of their long-awaited Fast & Furious Charger Daytona and '69 Mustang (sorry, no photos allowed). Both were decent, if simplified, replicas of their 1:1 versions. I'm looking forward to seeing the finished products of both, especially now that I'm nearly finished with my Daytona model.

Maisto


Finally, I knew about Maisto's Need for Speed movie cars before Toy Fair but was looking forward to seeing them in person. Maisto had both their sample and several boxed cars, and so far I like what I see. I will definitely be picking them up the first chance I get, and will review them at that time.

They also have several new and upcoming cars of interest, including a 2014 Camaro Z/28, 2014 Corvette Stingray Coupe, 2015 Mustang, and Lamborghini Huracán LP 610-4. Under the Bburago banner, we can look forward to seeing a McLaren MP4-12C, Bentley GT3, Bugatti Type 55, and a still-in-production BMW I8.


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