Children upset after knitted Santa torn from display

Nursery staff told some of the children that the miniature Santa had gone to help "big Santa with the big Christmas night"

A knitted Christmas-themed postbox topper created as a surprise for nursery children was destroyed by youths days after it appeared.

A mystery artist known as the Syston Knitting Banxy (SKB) made the topper, which featured a knitted Santa Claus, for Charnwood Nursery in Thurmaston, Leicestershire, last Tuesday.

Staff and children were delighted to see the decorated postbox, but by Saturday the knitted Santa on top was gone from his yellow-coloured knitted chair.

The nursery and SKB said they were saddened by the "thoughtless" act of vandalism.

CCTV images, seen by the BBC, appeared to show two young masked culprits tampering with the topper before ripping off the Santa from the top of the display in the early hours of Saturday.

SKB told the BBC: "It is especially upsetting to learn that the little children have been particularly upset by this thoughtless incident."

Mrs Palmer said the nursery was "long-established" in Thurmaston, with many of the local community's children having been there

Natalie Palmer, Charnwood Nursery's assistant manager, said the children had "loved seeing it every day" but were left upset to find it had gone within days.

"It's a time when people should be coming together and being kind to each other," she added.

"The fact that it's been destroyed outside of a nursery, which is for small children, it just seems extremely sad."

Mrs Palmer said she initially contacted SKB requesting knitted visual aids for storytelling.

And while the busy knitter was not able to help at the time, she offered to create something special instead.

Not long after, to Mrs Palmer's surprise, the Christmas topper had appeared on the postbox outside the nursery.

"We're just sad at the actual ferocity that they take the Santa," Mrs Palmer said of the CCTV footage.