Just realised that my local magic emporium, long since departed, used to be crammed with Chu Magic, and not Tenyo. Whilst I know they fulfill differing criteria they have both been at the forefront of consumer magic, and been graced with longevity. Anyone have any interesting info or insights, as I realise I know nothing of Chu whatsoever?

Absolutely love this ad from Chu's official site; http://www.chusmagic.com/topHat.html

Chu's stuff is made much more inexpensively.

They need to really for their particular market I guess, but I have bought some good quality stuff such as linking rings and colour change records in the distant past. It surprises me however that the really inexpensive and higher quality is mixed in the same 'range'.

I'm also reminded of the uk sold Paul Daniels magic range. A quality collection of card tricks, packet tricks and small gimmicked items. The great thing about these were they actually involved the rehearsing and development of certain skills to perform them competently. They also all coordinated across the range to provide a complete set/ act. A definite drain on pocket money though, but some very nice items back in the day.

The Paul Daniels Magic Range was released via a company called Dubreq.

Although the range was pretty much standard fayre, the instructions accompanying the tricks were exceptionally well-written.

The instructions for Paul Daniels' magic sets were probably written by Ali Bongo.

Thanks Merc and Richard, yes, the presentation on the Paul Daniels stuff was nice, especially the colour difficulty coded packet card tricks, with an excellent booklet to teach the effect, something I feel we are losing in the era of DVD tutorials. The text always instilled the ethos of practice makes perfect too, if I remember correctly. When I'd learned a card trick, even if it was a simple double backer effect, I did feel a sense of achievement, and unlike a book the info was concise and non overwhelming.

Ali was good at writing for children.

I don't know who wrote the instructions for the PD range. But I do recall Paul saying that they were re-written many times. Each time the instructions and prop would be given to some children in the appropriate age range to see if they could follow them and perform the effect.

This was most unusual as normally magic set instructions were written so no one could understand them.

I presume Ali Bongo also had a hand in the PD books and annuals. Whilst the magic was often very simplistic, they were never short of fascinating to this child, very well written indeed.

You can always tell if Ali was involved by the artwork. He had his own distinct style.