>>6397439I thought the image was a wooden scultpure of a Shambler for a second.
NOTE: I am not a professional toy designer.
As for trying to check all these boxes.
Kids (especially boys) want something "cool", this can either be crazy coloured or more drab "badass" realistic grimedge. These are often not cutesy, but often totally cartoony.
The problem with modern and minimal if you mean the adult "design" market is that they are often absolutely cartoony in a way. Simplified to a point where it starts to lack human or personality like qualities.
The educational part is tough, you can either go realistic for it to be educational, wich still will be cool and badass for the kiddies and has room for personality, but would completely negate the modern and minimal feel.
You could give it a playfeature, buildable or puzzle aspect for educational value, but that would probably make it way more expensive to produce.
I'd talk about your client about this.
The one thing i could think of is making some sort of robotic dinosaur, this will give room for modern and minimal design cues like shiny clean surfaces, mixed with being a badass robot/cyborg dinosaur for kids giving an explanation for the lack of character. Maybe even give it more realstic (maybe even working pushrods/pistons on legs or whatever for educational purposes)
While not educational, vinyl monster toys in the style from japan are a nice middleground between what kids like, cheap to produce but has also gathered an adult "design" following.
There are many many examples that range from very detailed and organic to simple clean shaped ones.
Using odd unicolour materials on otherwise more detailed designs can bridge the gap between modern/minimal and cool for kids too.
Silly Pic sort of related, but you get the idea.
