Mader Spinning Turn Top

Spin it. Watch it flip itself upside down. Watch it keep going.

The Turn Top is one of Mader's most surprising pieces. Set it spinning in the conventional way — top up, tip down — and then watch: within a few seconds, the top flips itself completely over and finishes spinning on the tip of its handle instead.

It is a genuine piece of physics that never quite becomes ordinary, no matter how many times it happens. This version runs in rainbow colours, becoming a blur of colour once it finds its rhythm. Hand-painted from a single piece of maple wood and varnished at Klaus Mader's workshop in the Austrian Alps. 

• Turn-over top: starts spinning tip-down, flips itself upside down and finishes on its handle tip
• Two colour ways available 
• Maple wood, height 4.2cm, diameter 3.2cm — compact and pocketable
• Difficulty level 3 of 6
• Handcrafted and hand-painted in Austria — ages 3 and up, not suitable under 36 months

Mader Kreiselmanufaktur was founded in 1991 by Klaus Mader, a carpenter who loved spinning tops and wanted to make them properly. His workshop sits in the foothills of the Austrian Alps, and each top is handcrafted — often by Klaus himself — from a single piece of sustainably sourced European hardwood. Some tops go through up to 20 individual processes: turning, burning, embossing, carving, brushing, painting, and varnishing. Every original Mader top is identifiable by the burned stripe around its equator. The colour method guarantees 100 years of colorfastness.