14 Apr, 2022

New city music toy library hits the right note

The City of Adelaide opens its first toy library today, with a particular focus on musical toys for children to explore their creativity.

Located at the Hutt Street Library, the new community facility will be a music toy library suitable for babies and toddlers, through to kindy-aged kids.

As well as featuring popular children’s favourites, the unique music toy library includes a range of musical toys and instruments that are safe, child-friendly and made of high-quality materials to ensure their durability.

The city’s south east is a popular residential zone which continues to grow, so this important community asset has been strategically placed in this key area at the Hutt Street Library, with a number of families in its immediate vicinity.

It will be staffed and resourced by City of Adelaide Library employees and open to the public from 10am to 1pm on Tuesdays and Saturdays.

Lord Mayor Sandy Verschoor said the new library will play an important role introducing music to young children.

“As a UNESCO Creative City of Music, the City of Adelaide is committed to fostering a lifelong love and engagement with music, through performance, education and participation,” said the Lord Mayor.

“Creating a musical toy library provides a point of difference to similar services running in neighbouring council areas and will help in children’s development.

“We know kids learn, explore, create and imagine through play time and music has been shown to particularly help children’s numeracy, literacy and coordination.”

Helping the Lord Mayor open the library was Deputy Lord Mayor Arman Abrahimzadeh OAM who brought the idea to Council.

“I think it’s important the city has a place for families and the community to come together, engage, learn and have a lot of fun,” said the Deputy Lord Mayor.

“As a dad, I know how expensive it can get buying new toys to keep children entertained and inevitably most of it ends up in landfill, so not only will this be affordable but it will also be environmentally friendly with each toy able to be used again and again.”

A key focus of Council is to attract more people and families to live in the city and providing this affordable community resource is another way we can help the residential population grow.

An annual membership to the music toy library is $30, or just $15 for concession card holders, with Council committed to funding the regular maintenance and replenishment of the toy stock to ensure it remains affordable. Find out more at cityofadelaide.com.au/toy-library

Ashleigh Pisani