It’s hard to imagine now how popular Airfix kit building was well into the Seventies. And some of the models they offered seem even more unlikely now than they did back then. This kit of two Robins is one of the strangest (as the Robin is much associated with Christmas, it lurks in our decorations box to come out each December!)
I’m not sure what sort of market they were aiming at. This model first went on sale in 1978 and disappeared in the early Eighties, part of a series which began a year earlier and included a Kingfisher, Bullfinches, Woodpecker and Blue Tits, most of which I’ve never seen (in kit form!) and are listed as ‘scarce’ on collector’s sites.
In truth the box is quite dull, unlike many of their regular models which had excellent art (much of it now gathered up in coffee table book form.) I suppose the illustration was designed to give modellers an idea of the correct paint scheme, though it would be very hard to achieve this level of detail without a lot of skill. Even the original Airfix logo had seen the stuffing knocked out of it here in favour of a simpler but much duller version.
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