An exhibition of classic British animation, featuring the works of family favourites such as The Clangers, opens in Canterbury on Saturday.

Among the displays at the Sidney Cooper Gallery, St Peter’s Street, are the original Clangers puppets, created by Peter Firmin from a combination of meccano and wood, with the skins knitted by his wife.

Peter, along with co-creator and narrator Oliver Postgate, animated the 1960s children’s stories, from his barn, pig stye and cow shed in Blean.

The Bagpuss creators also made the equally popular Ivor The Engine and Noggin The Nog through their Small Films productions.

“It was Oliver’s company that I worked with him on and we went right through from the sixties through to the eighties,” said Peter.

“We were working on a very small budget, but Oliver was able to adapt almost anything to take film, using a 16mm camera and we made pretty much everything from scratch.

“He would just tell me what he wanted and then we loosely sorted out the finances once we’d finished.”

Despite nostalgia and talks of potential comebacks surrounding The Clangers and Bagpuss, Peter admits we’ve seen the last of them.

“We don’t intend to make any new episodes. Somebody really has to have the same mind and imagination as Oliver and that’s not easy to replicate.

“He’s also not been very well recently, so we’re both sadly now retired.”

Work from fellow animator Bob Godfrey, best known for Roobarb and Henry’s Cat, is also on display. The exhibition runs until December 13.