Inside a toymaker’s museum-like home in Hong Kong

Put a fish in a big tank, they say, and it will grow to the size of its surroundings. Put a collector of “pretty stuff” in a 1,900-sq-ft space and this magpie’s nest of treasures is the result.

“That’s what happened here,” jokes Tim Stuart, an American toymaker and self-confessed hoarder. “It’s like, ‘Oh, look, space. Let’s fill it with clutter.’”

Museum-like, with collectibles on display everywhere the eye rests, the converted industrial unit Stuart has lived in for eight of his 11 years in Hong Kong will soon be returned to its shell when he and his family begin a new life, in Thailand. The items, mostly spoils from the neighbourhood, will then serve as mementos and, later, perhaps as heirlooms for their children.

“I happen to be in Sheung Wan,” he says. “It’s fantastic. People throw away the most amazing things here.”

One man’s trash was a large shop sign with gold Chinese characters reading Hollywood No 149. Stuart’s home, at the Cat Street end of that road, has become the resting place for many other finds besides, most haggled for or inherited, evincing method to charming madness.