230 Years of Screen-Free Play: Why Jaques of London Has Always Known What Children Need

In 1795, John Jaques founded a small games and toys business in London. He could not have known that 230 years later, his company would still be making the same kinds of things, wooden toys, outdoor games, strategy games, or that the case for making them would have become more urgent than at any previous point in the company's history. He did not need to anticipate screens to make things that were better than them. He was simply making the best play possible with the materials and knowledge of his time. The fact that this turns out to be exactly what children need in 2026 is not a coincidence. It is a vindication.

This is the story of what Jaques of London has always understood about children, play, and what genuinely matters, and why that understanding has never been more relevant than it is right now.

What Jaques of London Has Always Made

The products Jaques of London has made across 230 years share a specific set of qualities that have nothing to do with technology and everything to do with what good play requires. They are physical. They demand active engagement rather than passive reception. They present challenges that scale with the child's development. They produce no stimulation on their own, every moment of engagement comes from the person using them. And they are made from real materials that connect children to the physical world rather than a screen-mediated version of it.

This description, written in 2026, sounds like a deliberate response to the problems of the digital age. It is not. It is simply a description of what good toys and games have always been. The qualities that make a Jaques toy screen-free are not features added in response to technology. They are the foundational qualities of play itself, which Jaques has been expressing in physical form since George III was on the throne.

The Milestones That Shaped British Play

To understand why Jaques of London occupies such an unusual position in the screen-free conversation, it helps to understand what the company has actually done across two centuries of British childhood.

In 1849, John Jaques II designed the Staunton chess piece, the standardised chess piece design that became, and remains, the international competition standard. Every serious chess set in the world today uses the Staunton design or a variation of it. When a child sits down to learn chess anywhere on earth, the pieces in their hands descend from the design that Jaques created 175 years ago.

In 1851, Jaques became the first company to manufacture and sell croquet commercially, publishing the first standardised rules in 1857. The game that is played at Wimbledon, at Hurlingham, at clubs across the UK, and on garden lawns from Surrey to Sydney follows rules directly traceable to Jaques of London. The company invented a game that three generations of British families have used as their primary reason to be outside together without a screen.

In the Victorian era, Jaques introduced Ludo to Britain, adapted from the ancient Indian game Pachisi. Ludo became one of the most widely played family board games in the country and remains so today. Snakes and Ladders, Happy Families, and the standardised English rules for several traditional card games all passed through Jaques of London at some point in their history.

In the twentieth century, Jaques continued making the wooden toys, outdoor games, and strategy games that had defined its first hundred years, while most of its competitors pivoted to plastic, to batteries, and eventually to digital content. Jaques did not pivot. Not out of stubbornness, but because the things the company had always made were still the things that children needed most.

The Screen-Free Movement Catches Up With 230 Years of Practice

The Smartphone Free Childhood campaign gathered over one million parent signatures in 2024. The WHO recommends zero screen time for under-18-month-olds. The UK CMO recommends three hours of active play for under-fives. The Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health has flagged a decline in unstructured outdoor play. Speech therapists are raising concerns about language delays in screen-heavy toddlers. Cross-party parliamentary support is building for legislation limiting children's device access.

All of this is new. The solution is not. The solution has been on the shelves of Jaques of London since 1795. Solid wooden toys that require a child to supply the engagement. Outdoor games that give families a reason to be outside together. Strategy games that build the executive function and emotional resilience that screens erode. None of these were designed as screen-free alternatives. They were designed as the best possible versions of what they are. The screen-free part is a consequence of making them properly.

This is why heritage matters in this conversation. It is not nostalgia. It is evidence. A company that has been making the same kinds of toys for 230 years, and that has seen those toys remain relevant, valued, and in use across every generation of that period, has demonstrated something that no amount of developmental research can improve upon: that these things work. They have always worked. They work now more than ever.

What 230 Years Looks Like in Practice

The Jaques of London Noah's Ark is one of the oldest continuously produced toys in the range. The specific animals have changed slightly over the generations. The material, solid, responsibly sourced wood, has not. The play pattern has not. Children have been loading and unloading this ark, sorting the animals, giving them names and journeys, for longer than anyone now alive can personally remember. That continuity is not marketing. It is a demonstrated developmental truth: this is what a two-year-old needs to do, and this is an object that lets them do it perfectly.

The Jaques of London chess sets are built to the Staunton specification that John Jaques II created in 1849. The pieces that a child picks up today are in direct lineage from the pieces that families have been playing with for 175 years. The game they are learning, strategic thinking, forward planning, the management of winning and losing, is unchanged. The research that supports it as a developmental activity is new. The activity itself is ancient and proven.

The Jaques of London croquet sets are built to the specifications established when Jaques worked with the All England Croquet Club at Wimbledon in the 1860s. The mallets, the hoops, the balls, all meet the dimensions that 160 years of competitive play have confirmed as correct. A family playing croquet in their garden today is playing the same game, with the same equipment specifications, that Victorian families played before television existed. That game requires no electricity. It produces no notifications. It gives everyone at the lawn something to do together, at the same time, without a screen.

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  Croquet: invented by Jaques in 1851The game that brought Victorian families outside together. Still doing the same thing 170 years later. The outdoor game that requires no electricity and rewards every year of practice. Shop Croquet Sets
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  Chess: the Staunton piece designed by Jaques in 1849The international competition standard for 175 years. Still the best strategy game ever made for teaching forward planning, emotional resilience, and the skill of losing well. Shop Chess Sets
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  Wooden toys: made the same way since the beginningsustainably sourced solid wood. Non-toxic water-based paints. UKCA and CE certified. Made to last through more than one child. The same approach to making toys that Jaques has always had. Shop Wooden Toys
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  Traditional games: Ludo, Snakes and Ladders, DominoesJaques introduced Ludo to Britain. These games have been played by British families for over a century. They remain the best family games available because they work, across ages, across generations, without any electricity at all. Shop Traditional Games

Frequently Asked Questions

How old is Jaques of London?

Jaques of London was founded in 1795, making it 230 years old in 2025 and the oldest surviving sports and games manufacturer in the world. The company has been making wooden toys, outdoor games, and traditional strategy games continuously since its founding, outlasting every competitor that existed when it began by more than a century.

What did Jaques of London invent?

Jaques of London invented and standardised croquet (1851), designed the Staunton chess piece (1849) which remains the international competition standard, introduced Ludo to Britain, and published the first standardised rules for croquet in the English language (1857). The company also published early editions of Hoyle's Games, the definitive reference for card and board game rules.

Why has Jaques of London lasted 230 years?

Because the things Jaques makes, physical, open-ended, screen-free toys and games, are what children and families have always needed, in every generation. The company has not survived by adapting to trends. It has survived by making things that are genuinely good and that remain relevant precisely because they are not tied to the technology of any particular era. The screen-free movement of 2026 is the most recent vindication of an approach that Jaques has always taken.

Are Jaques of London toys good quality?

All Jaques of London toys are independently tested to UKCA and CE safety standards, made from sustainably sourced wood. , and finished with non-toxic water-based paints. The company makes its products to last through more than one child, and it is common for Jaques toys to be passed between siblings and generations within families. The quality is not a marketing claim. It is the reason the company has existed for 230 years.