Monday, April 2, 2012

Giving some thought to "fashion dolls"

This came up because I'm on a quest.  To find my fashion doll "collection" if you will.  There are many talented artists out there.  I love, love, love the work of so many of them...  I have to save and wait and save and wait, but in the end it will all be worth it.  The doll I'm working on getting now, I've been saving since November.  Once she is acquired, I will work on the next one.

I have to chuckle when people say Barbie was the first fashion doll.  Well, yes and no.  The first American fashion doll that was mass produced is probably accurate.  Even so, wasn't there Jan and Kitty Collier and some others??

I'm not a "fashion doll blogger" so, I really don't get wrapped up in who came first.  Speaking from my own experience, I owned Barbie (and Francie and Kelly (I think that was her name and it wasn't the little doll they have now-- it was in the Barbie family) and Tammy -- not Mattel) as a child -- I loved those dolls.

I digress....

Back in the late 80's I became somewhat obsessed with antique fashion dolls when I walked into a store and there I saw it... A headless doll.  I knew I had to have it.  I asked the woman and she apologized for not having a head.  I wanted it any way.  So it started.  (This was back before EBAY when you had to find a person who specialized in dolls, etc.)

Here's a pic of that doll now.  (I keep her under a bell jar on a dresser).  I searched in vain for a head for years -- news flash more bodies survive than heads -- so there are a lot more of them looking for heads than the other way around!  So here she sits, but she is always an inspiration.  I think of the finery she must have had at some point.


Amazing detail... individual stitched fingers, stitched toes.


She's got patches/repairs to her but her kid is taut and well stuffed (I'm assuming cork) -- They don't make 'em like this any more.

I was also thinking of another "fashion doll" I have.  I once saw a similar one in a magazine -- I've never seen one before or since...  

Please revisit my blog, I'll try to get some photos of her posted.



2 comments:

  1. That's something amazing! The doll without head may sound creepy for children, but adults like us look differently. It depends on our satisfactions of having it. The dolls sometimes don't have to be perfect with every parts, the beauty is within the doll itself, may be just the hands, the fingers alone,or just the over all shape is perfect for us. I have bought a doll from Octobereffigies.com and this makes me love the doll more and more. My mum sayd it looks like some kind of amulet or something that she didn't think it's a doll for play, but for me..I love It!

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  2. Thanks Nune, I appreciate your leaving me a comment! I saw the Octobereffigies. They are really something. I like them. Beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder. My daughters call most of the dolls: Creepy. Even funnier!

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