2024 Artist Insights: Nellco

From record players to laundry machines, Keepsake Artist Nello Williams has put out a new magic appliance ornament almost every year since. This year’s ornament, the Nellco Claw Machine, was inspired by Nello’s teenage years.

“I visited arcades now and then—this was pre-video games. And though I spent most of my time on the pinball machines, the claw machines were always there, too,” he says. “It didn’t take me very long to figure out that I was bad at them—not that I was very good at pinball either! But they are very interesting machines.”

Nello says after he settled on the claw machine idea he began researching and finding toy tabletop claw machines to reference for the design.

“My first concept had the claw picking up Christmas bulbs, but we liked the idea of referencing the Magic Snowballs that Hallmark produced several years ago,” he says.

Then, his team worked together to bring the machine to life. Nello says it took several attempts of trial and error to get it just right.

“When the front button is pressed, the claw rises up with a magic snowball in its clutches, moves toward the receptacle, and drops it in. The chute lights up, revealing the prize, and music plays,” he says. “I wanted to have the claw fumble the snowball halfway and include the sound of someone swearing, but for some reason, the team didn’t go for it.”

Lucky for us, we don’t have to beat the game to win the prize! You can take home your very own Nellco Claw Machine at Ornament Premiere in July.

Nellco Claw Machine