Wooden Banana Tree – Large Hand-Painted Tropical Tree Toy

About the Banana Plant

It looks like a tree, but the banana plant is actually the largest herb in the world. Its "trunk" is a false stem made of leaf sheaths rolled tightly around each other, and the huge leaves unfold from the top one after another. Bananas were probably first grown by people in New Guinea, and today they are cultivated across the tropics.

Each stem flowers and fruits only once. After the bunch of bananas ripens, the stem dies back, and new shoots growing from its base take its place – so the plant lives on for years. And the fruit itself? Botanically, a banana is a berry.

• Crown (two sections)
• Trunk
• Base

Also available as a Small Banana Tree. Build a tropical scene with the Large Palm Tree and Large Acacia Tree.

Assembled tree – Height × Width × Depth: 30.0 × 18.0 × 3.6 cm (11.8 × 7.1 × 1.4 in)

All pieces are shaped from solid ash wood and hand-sanded to a smooth finish with no sharp edges. They are hand-painted with water-based paints and finished with olive oil, which protects the wood against moisture. No plastics, no solvent-based finishes, no MDF, no veneers. Made in conformity with the European toy safety standard EN 71. Small variations in colour and grain are a natural part of handmade production, not defects.

A tree that is not really a tree.

The banana plant is full of surprises for curious children: a trunk made of leaves, fruit that is really a berry, a plant that grows a new stem after every harvest. Putting the pieces together asks for patience and careful hands, and the finished tree gives a jungle or rainforest scene its tallest landmark.

Inspired by Montessori and Waldorf principles, the banana tree links play to real food: the fruit children eat at breakfast grows on a plant they can now build and explore. There are no batteries, sounds or buttons – the child leads the play.

Solid ash is dense and hard-wearing, and every piece is sanded and painted by hand in our workshop in Romania. Tree by tree, the forest grows with the child and lasts long enough to be passed on.