#286 DIE SIKU-STORY (ULRICH BIENE)

I ordered this book because of my interest in the German toymaker Siku, a company which is not especially well documented on the web. When I tried to write articles about “Sieper Kunststoffe” I never found anything really interesting.

This book covers the whole story of the company, from its foundation in 1950 to 2013. The book is beautifully done and shows not only toys, but also other plastic items they manufactured in their early days, as well as pictures of many documents, boxes, instructions, catalogues, order sheets… these documents were surely provided by the Sieper family, through the company or its museum (Siku//Wiking Modellwelt in Lüdenscheid, Germany).

You won’t find anything more complete than this if you’re interested in the history of Siku, its production and many anecdotes. But consider, this is not a collectors’ catalogue or a price guide, many different models appear in the book, although nothing in particular is said about them... If you’re looking for a checklist, price guide or variants list, this is not your book.

The author Ulrich Biene has written several books about Wiking models, a trademark that also belongs to Siku nowadays. His last book on this topic “Wiking-Welten: Über Modelle, Sammellust und Leidenschaft” was published by the same house “Delius Klasing”. This is his last work and was released in May 2012.

The book is in German language and can be easily found in bookstores or online shops.