Passion for... prams

Many Maltese are crazy about modified cars, but a nursery school assistant from Attard has a passion for a different kind of four-wheeled contraption – she collects prams.

After amassing dozens of ornamental prams, Theresa Gatt, 52, is happy to have obtained a full-size pram. Her next target is an old doll’s pram.

Ms Gatt has been living with babies and young children all her life, even before she did a nursery course and worked as a nannyin the UK.

“We lived in Paceville and our neighbours had three children, who they used to let us look after. My three sisters and I used to take it in turns to wheel the prams up and down the pavement for hours on end, so prams have always been on my mind.”

Her interest in prams was rekindled when she was given a miniature crystal pram for her birthday, and she has since accumulated a small collection, combing markets and antique shops for anything she can find.

“They’re made out of all sorts of materials – plastic, china, silver – as long as it’s a pram I’ll buy it!”

Ms Gatt moved from miniature prams to life-size ones when a friend gave her a book about prams as a gift. This, together with the fact that she had become a grandmother, spurred her on to start searching for an old pram to take her granddaughter around in.

She searched high and low but many of the prams she came across were in a state of disrepair, left to rust and rot in garages and roofs. She finally struck gold in a garage in Fgura, where she came across a Silvercross black pram from 1947 in almost perfect condition.

“It didn’t have a single tear on the cream interior, just a few small scratches on the body. The only thing that needed changing were the tyres, which I found through pram restoration websites. Everything else is original.”

After cleaning it and restoring it to its former glory, Ms Gatt showed off her pram and her granddaughter in the scenic surroundings of San Anton gardens.

How do people react when Ms Gatt tells them about her hobby?

“They think I’m crazy!” she laughs, “but once they come and see the pram they quickly change their minds because it’s so pretty and shiny.”

Ms Gatt said posh prams are making a comeback among the well-to-do in England. “They can cost up to £1,000. I believe David and Victoria Beckham have one.”

She laments that unlike the UK, there does not seem to be much interest in prams in Malta.

“In England there’s a pram museum, and there are several websites dedicated to them.”

She wants to try and start up a website to catalogue and show off these prams in Malta.

“Unfortunately, people used to give prams away when they no longer needed them. My mother had given her pram to a woman who ended up selling eggs out of it,” she said with a chuckle.

Anyone who has an old pram can call Ms Gatt on 2142 3143.