• Skip to main content
  • Skip to secondary navigation
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Alex Milway - Official Website

Children's author, illustrator, screenwriter

  • About
    • School events
    • Screenwriting
  • Newsletter
  • My Shop
  • Blog
  • Free Books
  • Hotel Flamingo
  • Pigsticks and Harold
  • All Books
You are here: Home / Books / Big Ears’ house has a few design flaws

Big Ears’ house has a few design flaws

22 February, 2011 by Alex

My daughter was given a few Noddy board books recently. They taste nice, apparently, but they do also have pretty pictures. While looking at these, it becomes apparent that many of the Toyland buildings are impractical. I’m not usually one with much of an architectural opinion, but I feel compelled to comment.

First up is Noddy’s house, which is built solely with toy building blocks, and lacking any form of mortar. Anyone with any experience of toy building blocks will know they spend most of their time toppling to the ground – a strong wind and Noddy’s house would fall apart.

But second, and much worse than that is Big Ears’ house, built inside a very chunky mushroom. It looks like a nice place to live, but building a home in a mushroom would have one serious consequence: it would be a very short-term let. You’d have a few days, at best, before your roof curled up and shrivelled away. And seriously, why fill the mushroom stem with a staircase? I mean, you could have had an external spiral staircase, and used the stem as a downstairs loo with a cupboard for storage space.

Those Toyland designers need to watch Grand Designs.

Filed Under: Books Tagged With: bigears, grand designs, noddy, toyland

About Alex

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Avid fan says

    5 April, 2011 at 20:38

    Hmm? Alex who? Seems you’ve overlooked the fact that the audience of these books don’t need to know the intricacies of design, but rather delight in the quality of the stories. Perhaps you should check your smart mouth at the door before you make such ridiculous comments!

  2. alex says

    6 April, 2011 at 00:52

    Best comment ever, thank you!

  3. StuartW says

    6 April, 2011 at 01:42

    Alex, I made similar points to a letting agent recently, who had neglected to mention that the cottage I would be viewing was based within a fungus. My concerns regarding the texture of the walls and the odour that permeated the residence were batted away with smooth-tongued flim flam and poppycock. Then he departed on his souped-up, alloy-wheeled, bright yellow trike, while I literally choked on his dust.

    These people.

  4. admin says

    6 April, 2011 at 02:35

    Ha! The problems associated with renting mushrooms! I don’t know

  5. Boris Thump says

    6 April, 2011 at 04:28

    Next thing you’ll be saying is that Santa ‘is too fat to carry all those presents’ or the Easter Bunny just isn’t ‘ethically possible’. PC gone mad!! You’ve ruined my life!!!!

  6. Sarah McIntyre says

    6 April, 2011 at 04:31

    Mr Alex, your smart mouth is going to get you in trouble one of these days. WITH ALL THE LITTLE PEOPLE. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. Such ridiculous comments, indeed!

    I am, quite frankly, appalled.

    Appalled, I tell you.

  7. Deadly Knitshade says

    6 April, 2011 at 04:41

    I don’t know. I mean, I just don’t think there’s mushroom in there for furniture…

    That Big Ears is a fungi though. Parties at his house are rockin’.

  8. alex says

    6 April, 2011 at 04:51

    Boris, I can only apologise.

  9. Alex says

    6 April, 2011 at 04:55

    Sarah, I like gnomes, and some of them are my best friends, but really, they should think more about the planning of their mushrooms.

  10. Alex says

    6 April, 2011 at 04:57

    Lauren, there are no puns allowed on this blog. Puns are punishable by gnome invasion!

  11. Marvin the Martian says

    19 May, 2011 at 08:44

    If you watch Grand Designs, particularly the first few seasons, you will find that the term “Noddy house” is regularly used as an insult [e.g. S1 Ep7], often by the presenter Kevin McCloud, to some specific type of house which is never specified.

    That’s actually why I ended up here; I like insults but I’d like to know exactly when/how to use it. I’ve still not found what the disparaged “noddy house” exactly is or is not (is it prefab houses? boxy houses? traditional houses?); e.g. “an 80s style noddy house” is mentioned that would fit in an Islington (London N1) conservation zone would definitely not be boxy or prefab. GRRR>>

  12. admin says

    27 May, 2011 at 02:15

    Hey Marvin, thanks for stopping by. Noddy House is a great insult to a building, which I can only imagine is used because a place has been built by toys, or people ill-suited to building! Also Noddy’s place has plenty of embellishments, but from what I can tell, no mortar between the bricks.

  13. aysha says

    15 November, 2011 at 05:07

    I study in collage and I should do report about problems in construction
    so please if you can help me to give me information about
    1- what are the most problems which can happen in construction site ? ( general information and explain these problems at least 8 papers)
    2- what are the soluation of these problems ? ( general information and explain these problems at least 8 papers)
    if you have information and can help me send your information at ( aysha1989@live .com)
    thanks

Primary Sidebar

Welcome to the blog of author-illustrator Alex Milway! Read More…

Latest book out now!

Hotel Flamingo Fabulous Feast

Hotel Flamingo: Fabulous Feast

By Alex Milway

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ ‘My 7 year old absolutely loved this book! Highly recommend!’ – Amazon review

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ ‘Brilliant. My children love this collection of books they enjoy reading them and the artwork illustrations are great. This is the 4th in the series and is excellent.‘ – Amazon review

‘Truly heartwarming and uplifting. I’d love to book a room there myself’- Philip Ardagh

‘Hotel Flamingo is bursting with charm, friendship and fabulous characters!’ – Laura Ellen Anderson

View Book

Categories

Search

Footer

  • School events
  • My Shop
  • My Books
  • About
  • Pigsticks and Harold
  • Screenwriting
  • Hotel Flamingo
  • Blog
  • Privacy Policy

Join my Newsletter!

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • YouTube

Copyright © 2021 · Author Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in