Pimp My Oystercard

By Londonist_ben Last edited 204 months ago
Pimp My Oystercard
oystercard.jpg

Yesterday we let you know about badoyster, a company making satirical oyster card wallets. This got us thinking, why haven't more people got cool oyster wallets? An oyster card is something that most of us carry but most of us still use a battered Tfl one with all the colour coming off.

Well, it seems badoyster aren't your only way out of oyster wallet boredom. Oyster card wallets might just be the fashion accessory of 2007. A little while back, tasteful wallets like these were on sale at the currently closed London Transport Museum and they are also beginning to be used as promotional tools, such as this one used by band Dragonette.

Thank you to those of you who alerted us to the fact that, to commemorate the 60th anniversary of the arts council, more than 100,000 specially designed ticket wallets, featuring the work of leading artists including Tracy Emin and writers such as Jeanette Winterson are being given out.

We have our fingers crossed that we'll pick up one of the 1000 knitted wallets.

However, this Guardian columnist had a hard time finding any of them,

Next stop Paddington, the official launch station of the celebratory plastic wallets. Again I explained what I was searching for to the man in the ticket booth, which prompted the response, "I've been here since five o'clock this morning, I was the very first clerk here and I'm telling you that there's been no delivery. They're not here, love."

So, launched today they may be, but available they are not. Or so I had concluded before I decided to venture into the mainline station and grab a coffee to ensure that my little sojourn had not been entirely in vain. Here, far from where Oyster cards are sold, topped up or in fact used, girls in bright pink T-shirts are handing out wallets to confused tourists fresh from Heathrow (who, I am fairly sure, are not in possession of Oyster cards, and therefore have little need for an artistic housing for them).

Have you seen any of these outside of Paddington mainline station?

Last Updated 22 March 2007