The Desi Doll Company

The interactive toys helping children learn about faith

Queen’s Award winners for Enterprise in International Trade 2020, The Desi Doll Company creates talking dolls, prayer pillows and talking books to help children learn about religion through play. The latest innovation is an Arabic keyboard toy, where children can press a keypad to listen to and learn short verses from the Quran.

These innovations require extensive research and development, so the funding and support provided by the Innovate UK Inclusive Innovation Award will be crucial. Recognising the demand for religious education toys, with export business accounting for over 50% of annual turnover in over 30 different countries across five continents.

The Desi Doll Company aims to make their products as accessible as possible and explore creating similar toys for other faiths and languages.

After having her own children, founder Farzana Rahman realised that children learn best through play and decided to create fun ways for them to learn about her faith. Increasing positive representation is another important goal for The Desi Doll Company:

“I want to create toys that help Muslim children feel represented and included. The toys can also be used by those not of the Islamic faith to satisfy their curiosity or increase their knowledge of another faith and language, and create healthy conversations,” Farzana says.