Airfix. One simple, made-up word that conjures happy images of rainy afternoons spent scanning complex instructions, impatiently waiting for parts to dry and getting our very first taste of sniffing glue.
This year is the legendary company's 70th anniversary and to mark this landmark, unofficial Airfix historian Arthur Ward has compiled this unashamedly nostalgic portrait of the construction kit manufacturer, The Boys' Book of Airfix (Ebury Press), filled with pages and pages of what can only be described as model-making porn, from the first model in 1949 (a tractor) right up to the current range, (the firm was recently rescued after a buy-out by Hornby).
To describe this account as exhaustive would be an understatement (believe us when we say you might want to skim read the sub-chapter called 'Injection Moulding') but a trawl through this celebratory tome and it's hard not to be tempted to get the Hummel paints out again one Sunday afternoon. As Ward writes in the introduction: "Don't get me wrong - computer games and MP3 downloads are great - but isn't there a place for file, tweezers, polystyrene cement and enamel paints?" Yes, Arthur, there most certainly is. £20
