Design
The Marco Sky L is not too bad looking for a stadium style double pram. At the moment it's only available in Rio (grey and red) and looks quite compact without the hood. With the hood on passersby might never know number 2 was in there.
The construction is solid, especially the chassis and the components are of varying quality; the seats are nicely padded and fitted out but the handles and harness clips are a bit on the plasticy side.
Features
The Marco Sky L sacrifices some features to obtain the compact size but still features swivel handles and a large rear removable hood with window that covers both passengers.
The seats are wide and well padded for comfort, the rear seat has a reasonable recline and is suitable for a newborn. The hood is a good size and will shield both your babies from the sun well but needs to be removed to fit a taller toddler in the back.
Performance
The Marco Sky L handles well for a stadium style pram because of its shorter than average length. Also the big wheels make going up and down curbs easier. It has suspension and the front wheels can be fixed which makes for a smoother ride off road but it’s not really made for rough terrain. You can’t push this pram with one hand but then again you wouldn’t expect to.
This pram is well suited to twins from 6 months, the rear seat is quite elevated so both babies have a clear view out. Also the rear seat looks like it has limited leg room but once you have a toddler in it you can see that it's reasonably comfortable. However, the heavier your twin load the harder it is to steer, close to full capacilty (30kgs) pushing it is a real workout.
Only the rear seat reclines which is one of the compromises you make for the shorter chassis but the mechanism is very simple to use. The seat covers are removable and washable.
The umbrella fold has a trick but once you know it, the action is easy. The fold size is surprisingly small; only marginally larger and longer than your average umbrella pram. You can easily remove the back wheels if you need it to fit it into a smaller car boot.
The brakes are easy to use; they are just a flip on, flip off action. You need to engage both sides to put them on but just one side to flick off. Also this pram comes with a double rain cover, clearly the Austrians don’t live in a la la land where it never rains.
This pram gets the toddlers thumbs up for comfort and design. I’ve never seen such enthusiasm from our toddler testers for a pram before. Before we’d even had time to look it over each of them had chosen a seat and were ready to go. After the pram had been put away ready to go to its tester family it would be greeted with little chants of ‘pram, pram’ every time it was spied by the little guys.
Drawbacks
The shopping basket is very small, and pretty inaccessible, however, you can hang shopping from the handles as this pram is quite stable and solid. Having said this you should always be cautious when hanging anything from your pram.
Handle length-wise, this pram is great for dads to comfortably push around but if you are a shorter mum or just a shortie parent the higher handles may make this pram more difficult to steer and get up and down curbs.
I’m not a big fan of the hood because it really closes an infant in the rear seat in, however it does have some advantages. Its great protection from the sun and the cold and removes and reattachs really easily so if you don’t need it you can leave it in the car.
Conclusion
The Marco Sky L is definitely one to investigate if you are in the market for a stadium style pram. It offers a unique set of features that you can’t find anywhere else.
Marco Sky prams are available at selected baby shops or directly from babydaze online.
About Marco Kinderartikel
If you can’t tell from the name, Marco Kinderartikel is an Austrian company that makes baby gear. They have quite a large range of double prams, of which the two stadium styles are available in Australia.
