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Vivian Chen

Teddy bears, tin tanks and Superman action figures crowd the shelves in Ambrose Lee Siu-chak's  toy shop in Central. It's so crowded Leung can barely turn around without knocking over an item, so he stretches slowly and carefully to pluck a furry monkey from the top shelf. 
The stuffed toy is a little worse for wear: a seam at the neck has come undone, with a tuft of cotton sticking out from the tear.
'It's no big deal,' says Lee. Taking out his sewing kit, he threads a needle and  begins closing the seam. 'This will be done in a couple of minutes. I only have to do a zigzag stitch strong enough that the seam won't come apart easily.' 
Leung, 46, opened his shop, Toy Museum, eight years ago to sell vintage and limited-edition items and soon developed a sideline 'hospital' service.
His clients began requesting help repairing treasured items, so he turned doctor and has since resuscitated about 200 toys, from teddy bears to toy soldiers and robots. 
'For many customers, these are not just toys. The item might be a birthday present or a graduation gift - there are sweet memories behind each one,' says Lee. 'Even if the toys are not expensive, they have significant sentimental value.' 
A self-proclaimed 'toy junkie', Lee says his parents had little spare cash for playthings when he was a child. So when he could buy his own, Lee began collecting Japanese tin toys, which gave him his first repair experience as they rusted easily in Hong Kong's humidity.
Still, he never envisaged running a toy business. Lee studied commerce in Toronto and worked for house and building supplies chain Home Depot after graduating. He returned to Hong Kong a decade ago to help his brother who had opened a toy shop in Causeway Bay, and two years later set up his own in Prince's Building.  
Among Lee's recent restoration projects was a 30-year-old vintage Monchhichi, from a line of palm-sized monkey dolls created by Japanese toymaker Sekiguchi. Because he couldn't wash the fur with water, Lee combed through it with soapy foam. 
Restoring its face, where paint had peeled from parts of the doll's eyes, nose and cheek, required even more painstaking work. He had to try out many paint combinations before finding a shade that matched the original.
The Monchhichi's owner, Irene Lau, has been collecting the line of dolls for years but the one she sent to Lee is her first and the one she's fondest of.
'I grew up with it and always keep it with me, even when I travel overseas,' says Lau, a senior executive in a hotel chain. 'Although I have many toys, she is unique - almost like a part of the family.' 
It was her reluctance to part with the doll that caused the restoration to take three weeks - far longer than Lee normally would need for such a simple job. 
'I only got to keep the toy over the weekends because my client couldn't bear to be separated from it,' he says. 
Such responses from clients don't surprise Lee. 'They may be senior executives or important people in their field but when they come to me with their toys, they are all like kids.'
One client asked for a set of 17 vintage G.I. Joe figures to be spruced up before  he passed the collection on to his son. 
The toy doctor also recalls the chief executive of a major company who came in with a blue teddy bear that he had kept for 40 years. 
'He couldn't fall asleep without the bear. It was almost like his security blanket. I bet if you kidnapped the bear, he would probably pay whatever you asked for,' Lee says jokingly.  
He typically charges HK$500 for each restoration, but fees can go up to HK$6,000 for more complicated tasks, such as fixing rare teddy bears or G.I. Joe dolls. 
Lau, who paid HK$600 for her Monchhichi doll to be restored, says she wouldn't have minded spending more. ' I could have paid thousands as long as it was fixed and returned to me safely. I was so anxious when I left it at Lee's toy hospital, but when the doll came back as if it was spanking new, I knew it was worth the wait,' she says.
Lee acknowledges most of his repairs don't involve sophisticated techniques but says some knowledge of toys is required. 
'You must have experience to know the right way to deal with it. My toy retailing experience has certainly come in handy,' he says. 
The duration of the repair depends on the material used and the damage. Sewing up buttons may take an hour but a complete 'rejuvenation', which involves cleaning, colour retouching and assembling missing parts for the toys, can require a month. 
Mechanical toys are usually disassembled and the components given an anti-rust coating before being reassembled. But some toys are in such bad shape that parts have to be replaced.
Getting the right components can be difficult, especially for vintage items, so Lee collects broken and used toys as well as glass eyes and buttons from discarded teddy bears. 
The cache of spare parts he has accumulated over the years is vital to his toy hospital. Lee has managed to give new life to many clients' worn out toys by matching them with 'healthy' parts. Doing so can take a while: he once spent more than six months searching for a part to fit the wings of a limited-edition Buzz Lightyear figurine. But Lee is usually rewarded for his efforts. 
'I love seeing my clients' smiles when I return their toys. Their entire faces light up,' he says. 'It's quite ironic; when I was younger I had the time but couldn't afford toys, but now I'm too busy to play with toys. The repair process is actually the only time I get to really play with toys now.' 
Although there is a long waiting list at his toy hospital, Lee doesn't accept every request. Selling toys, not fixing them, remains his first priority. Still, he once fixed a client's antique tin robot for free just so he could play with it.



Repairs of the heart