The mother of all western fashion dolls came out in 1959. This is the kind of thing sold in teen girl fashion magazines at the time:
Looks pretty familiar! I may have some vintage doll dresses that look exactly like a couple of those styles, right down to the shoes and plastic ring bracelets.
Underneath, these gals were probably wearing something like this:
With names like "Figure Controller" and "Mold 'n Hold" let's make no mistake here:
This is shapewear. It's not a corset, but that's only because the underwear technology advanced to the point steel bones weren't needed.
Corsets were still around, and they shaped more of the body than ever:
Instead of starting at the underbust and ending at the hip, they go from the armpit to the thigh, lift your butt or flatten your butt depending on your needs and take 2" off your waist! These liberated ladies of the almost 1960s who could vote had more restrictive undergaments than... well, ever.
This is what was necessary to get a model into shape to wear those dresses.
The dolls from this time were made to have the same proportions of a model wearing an insane amount of shapewear because otherwise they wouldn't have looked like the models in the dresses at the top with clothes on.
For the next 40 years, Barbies had the same proportions. For 40 years, other doll companies realized having dolls of similar proportions that could share clothes would boost their sales because people could use their existing doll wardrobes on the new dolls. For 40 years, people bought, made, and passed down their doll wardrobes to their kids, so of course they wanted their dolls to all be the same shape.
40 years is enough time to create a tradition so that people forget something else is an option.
It's only been recently that people started bucking tradition and making fashion dolls with different body shapes and succeeding. When Bratz & Monster High first came out, there were lots of people talking about how they wouldn't be popular because they couldn't use existing doll clothes. I'm glad those awesome doll lines were able to prove people wrong because they broke the ground that got us all the cool different body shaped dolls today!
BUT.
In the human world, at about the same time pret-a-porter (ready to wear) fashion was going from minority to majority. Lots of women still made clothes or altered their clothes to suit them better, but sewing stopped being as essential a skill.
Sewing used to be taught in public school. You can look up school books that covered sewing lessons for all grades. Everyone was taught stitch work, and how to draft patterns.
Actual sewing patterns from the everyone-sews era are wild! People were expected to look at this and be able to draw out an actual pattern tailored to their personal measurements/body shape because that was what most people had been taught how to do.
The thing about everyone being able to do this is that everyone got clothes that were perfectly tailored to them. There were no good/bad sizes or good/bad shapes as far as clothes were concerned.
Ready to wear fashion changed things. You measure a few hundred women and take the most average proportions and this is your standard shape. Sizes are then established for people with different sized frames, using the same shape. Clothes are designed around this shape and models are chosen to best show off this shape.
The problem with ready to wear fashion is that people are different sizes and shapes and 'standard' just means 'average'.
If you go into a clothing store and can't find clothes that fit you, it doesn't mean you're bad or ugly, it just means you're not average. I don't know why average is good in clothes but considered meh in every other aspect of our lives.
The second problem with ready to wear fashion is that once people stopped knowing how to sew, they stopped learning how to tailor different styles for different body shapes
If you were lucky, the fashions of your time favored your body type and you got along OK. Fashions in the 1950s-60s favored hourglass and pear shaped bodies, straight shapes were in vogue in the 1960s-70s, hourglass figures in the 80s, broad-shouldered inverted triangle shapes in the 90s. If you weren't lucky, pretty much everyone told you you were ugly even if your shape was perfect for another era's fashion.
Let's remove the advertising and explain what was really going on from the clothes manufacturer's point of view: "It isn't as profitable for me to make clothes that fit more than one body shape, so I'm going to pay magazines to write articles that call you ugly, sell people too small weight gain pills and people too big diet pills, crazy restrictive underwear to squeeze them into the right shape and make my profit margins even bigger."
This is why I LOVE having body diversity in dolls. Dolls are by definition pretty. "Pretty as a doll" means too perfect to be real.
When I make a pattern for different dolls, it showcases how the same fashion looks on different body types. There are some things that look amazing on Curvy Barbies that look fine on other body types. There are some things that look amazing on tall Barbies. There are some clothes that look amazing on Monster High dolls, or Rainbow High, or Bratz, that just don't pop the same way if they are on any other doll.
When people see this on perfect dolls they internalize that different body shapes all look good when wearing clothes that suit them. If a style looks good on Doll A but not Doll B, all it means is that Doll B needs a style that suits her instead. It's not HER, it's the CLOTHES.
Some styles just look good on a narrow range of body types. Some styles look good on different body types but they need to be tweaked with something like a fuller skirt or higher waist to really shine on that person.
I think this is something that people are slowly re-learning, and I'm so happy they are! It's not JUST the dolls, it's a variety of people catering fashion to different body shapes that aren't the most average/profitable, but the dolls help more than you think.
If a kid only sees a fashion doll with 1 body type, it will feel normal when they grow up and see all of the models with 1 body type and tricked into thinking there's something wrong with them. If a kid grows up with different shaped dolls, they're not going to be fooled as easily.
The dolls get there first.
]]>But, being a customizer and dolly doctor, I sat down with my dolls and did some experiments to see if I could find a preventative fix. I did, and it's pretty easy, so let me show you how:
Examining the wrist, it seems like the issue is the knob on the hand peg is just too big. I first tried to make it smaller with some sandpaper, but I found it very hard to sand only the knob and not the shaft, so I pulled out my razor blade.
Holding the hands by the hand on a cutting mat and carefully cutting AWAY from myself, I gradually shaved down the knob and put it back in the doll arm to see what the sweet spot for friction is.
You can easily shave down the knob to half the size and it doesn't decrease the friction noticeably. Shave it down completely and it goes back into the arm fine, stays in fine, but also comes out just as easily.
The ideal knob size seems to be ALMOST completely gone, but with a slight ridge left along the far end (which sort of naturally happens when you are cutting away from yourself). This is to get a hand that comes out only by pulling on the hand, but not with enough force to warp the wrist. It's slightly snugger than the original Monster High/Ever After High hands.
And that's it! Once I figured out how much I needed to remove, I took care of all the hands remaining among my G3 Monster High dolls at a rate of about 1 minute/hand.
If you decide to give it a try, remember to CUT AWAY from yourself and follow all safety rules for using sharp objects. Don't play fast and loose with safety rules! Even if you do, accidents can happen so attempt this mod at your own (and your dolls') risk.
Bonus! I customized my Abbey to look more like her promotional pictures. She's had her hair restyled to show her horns, eye wonk fixed, and dog nose removed and replaced with blushing on her nose and cheeks. Plus new clothes made from the Modern Hanfu pattern!
]]>10 years is a long time. Realizing you've been doing something for ten whole years comes with lots of feelings and introspection. Thankfully most of that has been good because I love what I do, but I have decided some stuff needs to change.
Like my URL: RequiemArt.com. Wait. I go by Requiem Art Designs as a business, what's wrong with my URL?
...because people who don't already know me generally read the URL as RequieMart.com. And RequieMart.com sounds like a cheap Alibaba.com knockoff hosted somewhere on the other side of the world, possibly run by shady individuals. Would you click on that if it came up in your search results?
Right! So the URL has to change. It's fine for people who know me already, but not so much for new folks. I decided on the new URL because it keeps my identity (Requiem Art Designs) and references what like 90% of the website is about (doll clothes).
I'm also taking this opportunity to change my Etsy shop name to match my website URL because honestly I should have done that a long time ago.
Not at all!
I still have RequiemArt.com, all the links will still work. If you have a bookmark with the old URL, it will be redirected to the same location with the new URL. If you forget the new name and send a friend a link to a pattern or repair tutorial, they will be automatically redirected to the same pattern or tutorial. The download delivery system is not affected by URL changes.
Etsy will do the same thing: automatic URL redirects for the new shop and keeps the old shop name from being used by anyone else.
So... that's all really. Here's to making it another 10 years!
]]>Guys, Mattel doesn't send me stuff in advance! I get them when I manage to find them at a non-scalper price online or IRL, which by my local stores is 2-3 months after the actual release.
Abbey is my favorite gal from the not-main cast (main cast fave is Cleo) for pretty much the same reason I love Cleo. Strong personality, independent, equally good by herself or with friends. And she can pick up Heath when he's being too annoying!
Now I *loved* the new Twyla, but I have mixed feelings on Abbey.
Pros:
Cons:
Abbey does NOT just have a Draculaura body with longer legs. She has a new body shape which is both chubbier and taller than Draculaura, but the height is only in the legs. The torso length is the same.
I'm kind of disappointed, NGL. I like Abbey having a bigger, thicker body, but part of her character is that she is very strong. So where's the muscle definition? She's just kind of...inflated. This is why I included the DC Super Hero girl doll in the comparison pic. This body was a scaled up version of the EAH doll with a little bit of muscle definition added to the sculpt. I would be 100% ok with Abbey's new body dimensions if she also had hints of muscle definition like the DC Super Hero Girl.
I think this is probably because Garrett Sander isn't involved in G3 Monster High. Garrett was the designer of the original Monster High line and made a LOVELY muscular-yet-feminine doll. I know he is behind the amazingly articulated She-Ra doll and was probably involved in the DC Super Hero Girls and the WWE girl dolls. Unfortunately he left Mattel years before the G3 reboot.
Apart from this brief and wonderful period of strong girl dolls, having girl dolls that are muscular is far rarer than non-skinny dolls. As a naturally muscular girl I have very strong feelings about this. I can tell you first hand that a lot of people act like if you can see real biceps on a girl she must be on steroids or a transexual. Girls who go to the gym are often very careful to not gain muscle bulk because of this kind of stigma. It sucks. So yeah, I had some hopes for Abbey as far as body-inclusivity goes. But that's a me problem, as far as expectations not meeting reality. At least she's tall I guess.
As far as sizing goes, I've got some good news and some bad news:
The good news is that with the bigger bust, in the upper body she is a great match for Rainbow High/Shadow High dolls from the waist up. Similar to how the new Cleo is a match for the other Monster High dolls in Petite Slimline size from the waist up. The bad news is she is not a perfect match for Petite Curvy size, being both taller and massively bigger below the waist.
Overall this is more good than bad because 4/5 patterns aren't fitted below the waist. Tops are fine, dresses with gathered skirts (which is most of them) are fine, the only things you want to steer clear of is anything body-con from the waist down: Pants, pencil skirts, and stockings.
Let's have a quick fit to demonstrate:
I left her handless because I can't understate the problem with the hands snapping off the wrist pegs. I feel like there's a counter that is gradually ticking down to zero at which point she will have no hands and the only thing I can do is delay it, not stop it.
Final thoughts:
I'm going to have to customize her just to get her to look like the promotional doll does. Which yeah, I can do, but most doll collectors can't, nevermind parents and kids.
I am glad that some of the Petite Curvy patterns fit, because she really, really needs new clothes.
]]>
Dang this was a tough decision! I decided to go with this style for the anniversary pattern.
My ideal anniversary giveaway pattern was something (nearly) everyone will want to sew and something (nearly) everyone can sew with not a lot of frustration. I think of the finalists this fits that criteria best, being something that most people won't need to go buy special supplies for and the one that will involve the least amount of tricky hand and/or machine stitching.
I can hear some of you through the screen going "but I wanted something complicated, that's what I need patterns for!" Don't worry, I'll get to those too. I will try and get some of the more complicated styles either as patterns or as options in pattern sets in the future. From my testing, none were un-doable in doll scale, and I've got no problem making them as long as I can put "Difficulty level: Advanced, pattern requires hand stitching" or something like that in the description so people can make their own decision on what they're up to.
Can't wait until Friday!
On April 18th 2013 I put my first pattern on Etsy (this one) because we all loved our Monster High dolls, but there were close to zero clothes options for them. I was a hobby dolly doctor and customizer, so I figured it would be another fun thing for the few people who needed patterns the same way my repair tutorials and customizing tutorials had been. 10 years later this is my full time gig.
I wore out my drafting ruler. My scissors are covered with scratches from being sharpened and re-sharpened. I've replaced 2 brand-new sewing machines. And I'm still enjoying the heck out of it!
You really never know where life is going to take you! And that's what makes life so fun :)
Anyhoo, let's have some more fun! To celebrate, I want to have a contest that anyone can enter that everyone will win.
This is going to be really easy. You don't have to design, you don't have to be able to draw (though you totally can) you just have to send me something you really, really want to be able to sew. It can be your favorite dress from your favorite costume drama, or something nostalgic from your life.
There are three conditions:
1) 1 entry per person.
2) No existing doll clothes. So like, don't send me pictures of Haunt Couture clothes and ask me to make a pattern of that. Not cool.
3) It has to be sew-able by most people. Because I know someone is going to want to send me something like this:
What also pops up a lot is that clothes sketches don't have to follow the laws of fabric. Like, there's a lot of anime designs that only work without gravity. Plus there's a lot of stuff that can't be miniaturized. A lot of that I can get around with slight style adjustments and fakery, but not everything.
Don't worry, if you send me a design that isn't work-able I will let you know. As long as you don't send it to me just before the deadline, that should give you time to send in another entry!
The final judge is going to be me, but I will be putting the designs up for popular vote on Facebook and Instagram. I want to see what you all like the best, and I'll pick from the top contenders something that I think will work best as a pattern.
There have been issues in the past with fun contests like this being ruined by people using bots, so being the final judge will I hope dissuade anyone from trying to stack the odds.
So what's all this for? A free anniversary pattern! I'm not 100% sure how this is going to work logistically, but there are a couple of options. The biggest complication is Etsy.
See, Etsy has a very limited amount of sales types/things you can do there. You can't give away free stuff. Best I can do there is bundle a pattern with an existing pattern. I've tried making a listing with the picture and the description having "DON'T BUY THIS, GO HERE AND GET IT FREE" and you'd think that would work, but hahaha, it did not.
The plan is bundling the free pattern with the associated doll size patterns on Etsy (Ex adding the free MH pattern to all MH doll pattern listings) and something similar here. That way people can get the anniversary pattern in the manner they want and not have to go to a second website, which I get can seem shady if you don't know how Etsy works in the not-allowing-free-stuff.
Most of the popular doll sizes. PS, PC, M Girl, 1/3 definitely, maybe others if I can swing it.
This is going to take me a bit of time, and depending on how complicated the pattern is (some patterns take more than a week to do, some take less) I may have to weave the anniversary patterns in with other patterns so that I can keep on a weekly release schedule.
The first Anniversary pattern will be out mid-May, but the second one may be the week after or two weeks after. You will know as soon as I figure it out!
Festivities will end a couple of weeks after the last pattern size. Then the anniversary patterns will be retired.
I don't talk about personal stuff much, but I had some long-covid related brainfog back in 2021. I was getting better, and then I got covid again. And then I was getting better and then I got covid again. I get better, but it takes a few months to go from the attention span of a golden retriever in a room full of tennis balls and needing a calculator to figure basic math like 2x4=? and functional most days.
If I have a relapse, I will let you know and adjust the release schedule when I am able.
Send your design to RequiemArtDesigns@Gmail.com by Sunday April 30, 2023
Voting will start 5/1 on Facebook and Instagram and end on Sunday, May 7th 2023.
Winning design will be announced on Saturday, May 13th
First Anniversary Pattern is scheduled for Friday, May 19th
]]>
First, let's compare the different generations and spinoff dolls:
These pics are taken straight from the new PS size chart btw so you can download that if you want a local copy to refer to.
The good news is overall the basic body shape has remained the same so the new dolls can (mostly) fit in the PS pattern size.
I suspect the gradual thickening of the dolls has been a choice made to make them more sturdy. I like that, except my new Frankie's hand broke the third time I removed it (once to get her stock on, once for the first outfit I tried her out in and once for the second) and with the bigger G3 hands it is absolutely necessary to be able to remove the hands to change the clothes. I know the arms are removable at the elbows too, but the friction at both the wrists and elbows makes me really nervous.
Now let's look at all the G3 body types so far:
Twyla is short the same way Frankie is tall: adjusting the calves. Otherwise their bodies are the same as the basic body (I showed Clawdeen but this is the same body Lagoona, Ghoulia, and Toralei have).
So this is great news for patterns! With these measurements, most of the dolls can have pre-G3 patterns adjusted very easily. Like so:
And here to demonstrate how that works in practice is Frankie!
Frankie is wearing two patterns I tested with the adjustment method: Level Up and Basics, as those are the two most popular patterns. Both of these patterns have had the adjustments added into the actual pattern sheets. If you bought them before now, you should have gotten an email with a link to the new pattern on Friday when I uploaded the new versions!
If you got either of these on Etsy, they don't have a function to send updates to purchased items, so just send me a message and I'll send you the new version manually :)
Let the sewing begin!
]]>
Well, my favorite original line doll was Cleo. I love her looks, I love her personality, I got more Cleo dolls than any other character. So whatever high bar I have for Monster High, it's especially, ESPECIALLY HIGH for Cleo.
...Cleo is also my favorite new G3 doll! But I also have some serious issues with her body.
Ok, from left to right I've got a G1 Cleo, a G2 cleo with a G1 head because I really didn't like her G2 head, and also the G2 body is customized so that her wraps aren't weirdly flesh colored, G3 Cleo, and G1 Nefera. I included Nefera in there to show how the new Cleo skintone stacks up. I've heard people calling her Nefera-colored and while is is darker, she has a warmer skintone while Nefera has a cooler one. Her body is slightly shiny like Nefera's though, and I love that.
G3 Cleo doesn't look much like G1/G2 Cleo, but then none of the G3 dolls do. I hate her ears, but I like her face.
The body is kind of... odd. Lots of people were saying she has the same body as Draculaura, but taller. Oh god no. She does not. I understand that she looks similar with the super thick thighs, but here's what happens when you try to do a clothing swap:
....right! Let's examine that in more detail.
It's the side view that makes you realize why Drac's clothes are so much bigger: she doesn't just have width added, she has depth added. Cleo mostly has width added.
This is why side-to-side doll comparisons can be really deceptive. If you really want to see what's going on, you need numbers!
I haven't had a chance to sit down and take all the measurements of the new dolls yet but I did take a few. Cleo's waist measurement is 6 cm (all other dolls besides Draculaura have a 6.5cm waist, Draculaura has a 7 cm waist) and a 6.8cm thigh girth (all other dolls besides Draculaura have a 6cm thigh, Draculaura has a 7cm thigh). Cleos' thigh measurement is 113% of her waist measurement and that is insane.
I've been thinking a while about how to talk about this because everybody has been like "whee body diversity" and I am very, very happy to have dolls with different body types even though it makes my life harder just like I was with the new Barbie bodies but... ok... imagine when they came out with the new Barbie bodies, they introduced a doll that looked just like Jessica Rabbit and a doll that looked just like the most photoshopped photo Kim Kardashian has ever had and everyone was going "OH GOOD MORE HEALTHY BODY TYPES" and you just kind of feel like you're going insane and wondering if your alarm clock is going to go off soon.
I invite you to measure your waist and thigh measurements. No, you don't have to tell me. Your thigh measurement will be smaller. You can do 1000 squats a day and wear a waist cincher and it will be smaller. Thiccc thighs and tiny waists are currently a fad, just heroin chic was a fad, just like the hourglass figure was a fad, just like the no-bust flapper silhouette was a fad just like the S curve was a fad.
There are fads in body types and the extremes of those fads are never healthy. If you want to celebrate there being different body shapes and that being OK, do! That is a great thing to normalize, but what shouldn't be normalized is instead of having 1 super unhealthy extreme body type, replacing it with multiple super unhealthy extreme body types.
So this makes me sad. Like, deeply sad. I am hoping that as more dolls come out, there will be less extreme fad body types (Abbey, when you come out I hope you are cut and have actual biceps).
I really wish that if this body was done, it was done on a doll that had a reason for it. Like Lagoona. It would make sense for a mer-girl to have very muscular legs and leg fins. On Cleo it just comes across as she's a diva and this is what a diva should look like. Bleh.
]]>This time around, the third generation of Monster High dolls has innovated in adding different body types. This is kind of a pain for playline dolls: it's hard enough to build *a* wardrobe for a doll when all the clothes in the line fit. This is why even though Barbie came out with 3 new body types, they were all close enough to the existing body that most clothes could be swapped between the dolls.
BUT! If there is any doll series that this wouldn't be a big deal for, it's Monster High dolls. Draculauras might share clothes with other Draculauras, but it was rare that she'd share clothes with Clawdeen. The girls just had such unique thematic color palettes and fashion preferences that even if you could, you didn't swap around much in between dolls. So making bodies different enough that they can't swap with each other? I think the pros (unique body shapes) outweigh the cons (less cross compatibility)
Draculaura is on the short/curvy body. At the time of release, she is the only doll to have this body type. A new bust joint has been added to the torso, this was previously seen in a G1 collector draculaura (the pink one in the coffin case that was a little taller). It's a good addition, bust joints don't add much range of motion but they add a lot of expressiveness.
The new Draculaura has the same length torso and arms, a shorter neck, and legs, and girthier measurements from the neck to the toes. Part of this is aesthetic, but it also makes it easier to make the limbs sturdier when the plastic is thicker. G1 dolls had a tendency to have arms/legs snap.
A better comparison to previous Monster High lines is to the current Rainbow High Line for Draculaura:
Draculaura is a much closer match in body shape to Rainbow High! In measurements, she's even closer than she looks in the picture. Her body sculpt is a little deeper (bigger measurement front to back) while Rainbow High is a little wider (bigger measurement side to side) but the overall measurements match up really well. Really, really well. Kind of suspiciously well.
The thing that makes me the least happy about new G3 bodies is that my massive collection of Monster High shoes cannot be worn by the new girls. Because those things were works of art. Most collectors would admit to buying dolls just because of the amazing shoes that were almost never reused. Assuming a large amount of people getting dolls now won't have an existing shoe collection, it still makes sense to use the old foot mold because the old shoes are just *so amazing*. New G3 shoes are fine. You know. Serviceable. Nothing anyone is going to buy a doll they don't even want to get their hands on those amazing shoes.
BTW, if the person or persons who designed the original MH shoes ever reads this, you are amazingly talented and I hope I come across whatever you're designing now/in the future.
Look, I said I was biased towards G1, didn't I?
As a doll collector/doll clothes designer, there are a couple of things that annoy me about the G3 Draculaura body: high cut molded on panties (boo). I never like these. If there must be panties, make them low cut so you don't have to worry about them peeking over skirts/pants/whatever. G2 Draculaura is wearing fabric panties and they easily cover her molded on panties.
The other thing that bothers me is the calves. This is a weirder one. When trying clothes on Draculaura, I like her fine in pants, but there's something about the shape of her calves that doesn't work with skirts that are cut around the knee which is pretty much all she wears. I compared her to other dolls and I think it's because when they made her calves shorter they took a bit off the top instead of modifying the overall shape and lowering the wide point of the calf.
Apart from those minor and admittedly nitpicky things, the new body shape is nicely cohesive, it doesn't look like they cut her in half and slapped a skinny upper on a curvy lower which was kind of an issue with the Curvy Barbie.
So what CAN she wear? Since she fits Rainbow High clothes so well, I popped on some clothes from the Rainbow High sized patterns (Petite Curvy). They all fit great. REALLY great! I haven't finished analyzing all of the new MH bodies yet, but if you want to kit out your G3 Draculaura, you can either steal stuff from your Rainbow High girls, Sew Petite Curvy patterns, or both!
]]>2020 sucked for everybody. I don't really feel the need to explain how it sucked for me personally, I mean you can probably guess a few things and be right about most of them.
Then along came 2021. Again, not going to get into it in too much detail but it was so much worse. On top of all the other crap I had some medical issues where one of the symptoms was brain fog to the point I couldn't do basic math without a calculator and had the attention span of a puppy with a bag of tennis balls. For most of the year.
Fortunately I seem to be doing better now. I have a lot harder time than I used to doing certain things and my attention span is still not great but I'm at least functional. I'm focusing on getting back on my weekly pattern schedule, and hoping that as that becomes easier I'll be able to add other extras in as well, like Materials Mondays and customizing.
]]>Rainbow High dolls heads only turn side to side. They do not pivot. This is not thaaaat big a deal, except their heads are slightly upturned so you can't have them looking at the camera from straight on. Like so:
If you want them looking at the camera you have to take a shot from above that makes them look shorter/squatter. It really limits the posing, which is a shame when the rest of the doll is so poseable.
Now I *heard* that you can work out the neck peg and stick in a barbie neck peg to get tilt. I tried it buuuut... 2 problems:
1. Without being attached to the doll on the inside, the head goes a bit floppy.
2. I don't really want to have to cut up a bunch of perfectly good Barbies.
So what I need is something that holds the doll's head on (already included in the peg) but to attach it to a ring that is similar to the barbie ring but a bit more rigid/slightly larger so that it holds itself inside the neck without needing to be attached on the inside.
Here's what I came up with:
These things come in all different sizes. This is the one that I found to fit best.
I then did this with the existing neck peg:
Note: the ^ shape at the top of neck pegs? Totally unnecessary. For adults. These are to make heads super hard to remove so that a 1 year old doesn't pry off the doll's head and choke on it. I always clip these off
So I used the hook screw to recreate the shape I needed. Now the first doll I did this with, I was just able to screw the hook through the clipped off neck piece, but some of the neck pieces I made I needed to drill a hole to make it easier. 1/18" drill bit does it.
To get the screw into the neck I heat up the neck to make the plastic slightly more pliable. This makes it just soft enough to jam the round end into the neck. If the neck is warped by doing this, I heat it up more and squish it back into the shape it's supposed to be.
To adjust the looseness of the neck, I just twist the disc slightly up or down on the screw. A bigger gap between the disc and the neck, the looser the head (and more poseable). The tighter, the less pivot. If you tighten it to the max, you'd end up with a neck peg that just twisted like the default neck pegs.
I try to find the sweet spot where the head stays posed in the angle you put it in, but doesn't move around on its own. This is a little harder because the dolls heads are pretty heavy, but it is totally doable.
And here's the result!
So cute <3 how about another
Yassss so much improvement.
OKAY! Now before you run off and do this to all your dolls, I've got a few kind of important things to mention.
First: YOU DON'T NEED TO POUR BOILING WATER ON YOUR DOLL TO GET THE HEAD OFF!
Seriously, I see this in so many video tutorials and in like half of them the person ends up scalding themselves. Just don't. If you already did the doll's hair or face, heat the bottom of the doll's head with a blow dryer. It'll save you having to redo the hair or possibly screw up a faceup.
You can use boiling water of course, you just don't *have* to.
Second: After you get your doll's head off, heat up the neck. This is the part I do use boiling water for. This makes the neck peg pliable, you can just rip it out (almost always) with a pair of needle nosed pliers in one piece.
Third: ^ "almost always"= things can go wrong. I did 6 dolls, 4 came off perfectly, 2 had issues.
Both of the dolls that had issues were wave 2 dolls, so that might mean something about wave 2 materials, but maybe not. Could be coincidence!
The first one, the neck seam of the torso split along the seam when it pulled the neck peg out. Easy enough fix: I fused it back together with super glue after I put the new peg in and let it sit for 24 hours to cure before putting the doll head back on to be safe.
The second one was more of an issue. The neck peg snapped when I pulled it out beneath the disc, not down at the base, leaving me with a stuffed neck and no easy way to get it out. For this one, I pulled out my dremel and carved out the neck peg that way. Popped the new neck peg in, good to go.
Other things could probably go wrong too, but that's just a risk when you customize. So don't experiment with your favorite, no longer being sold, limited edition doll if you aren't confident you can fix anything that can go wrong.
Yasss such a difference <3
]]>All the dolly details:
When I sort my dolls into sizes I pay less attention to their measurements as their overall shape. Humans generally fall into the same shape. No, we're not all the same shape obviously but if you're 6' or 5' your various bits all falling into the same area relative to each other so more attention is paid to your girth measurements like bust, waist, hip. This method doesn't work so great with dolls.
The first dolls I compared Rainbow High dolls to were other curvy dolls:
The horizontal red lines are aligned to various parts of the Rainbow High doll's anatomy (shoulder, bust, waist, hip, seat, knee, ankle) to show where other dolls do/do not line up.
Measurements wise, she's pretty similar in bust/waist/hip to Curvy Barbie and Squirrel Girl, but these are girth measurements. With the same hip height, where Curvy Barbie's smallest point is (waist) Rainbow High's bust is. So where Curvy is going in, Rainbow is going out. Squirrel girl is in between, with a slightly longer torso than Rainbow and slightly shorter torso than Curvy and can share clothes with both OK but not great, while Curvy and Rainbow have mostly problems sharing.
If Rainbow had a similar body shape, she would have measurements proportionately smaller at the same % that she is shorter. You can't just enlarge the pattern for the torso height because then she would be significantly larger in bust/waist/hip.
Let's try another one:
Here we have a lot more stuff lining up! Shoulders and busts are generally in the same place and the same size, seats are in the same place, but waist is in a different location (higher up), hips are much bigger and thighs are much bigger.
I pulled out some of my fit-then-flare patterns that are only fitted at the bust and shoulders like Tea Gowns and Shirr Romance to see if these clothes could fit the Rainbow high dolls. Eh. Technically yes, but aesthetically very much no. While the skirts stretch over the hips fine, they stretch over the hips to the point where the gathers become un-gathered. There's already a wide hip variation in the Petite size to accomodate the difference between the hippy pure neemo, Obitsu 24, and Hasbro Disney Descendants & Disney Princesses lines from narrower hipped Licca, Neo Blythe and Skipper dolls, but for those dolls the waist is about the same size, closer to the same location, and the thighs are the same size.
Finally, I did a mockup of the 3 current MGA fashion doll lines next to each other:
For this one I didn't do reference lines, instead I superimposed the OMG doll's torso over the other two dolls.
I have sorted the OMG and Pom dolls into the same size (Chibi) with 2 different torso variations because despite being way different heights, they have similar thighs, hips, bust, shoulders, and those things all line up at the same heights. The major difference is waist, which is minor enough that most patterns can do both dolls with a cut adjustment.
Rainbow High has roughly the same shoulder and hip as the other two dolls so you do see some sharing of things that only fit at those locations, like flared skirts that sit across the hips. Stuff that fits at more than 1 point, like a sheath dress or even a blouse, doesn't match up to be the right #s in the right places.
So the final verdict? Petite Curvy. Petite for shorter than the average 1/6 fashion doll, and Curvy for, well, curvy. Behold, the beginning of a new doll pattern size!
You can check out the new pattern size here. Obviously not a lot in it yet because it's new and it takes me a while to make patterns, but if Rainbow High is your thing, give it a bookmark and check back to watch it grow :)
]]>In person I was pretty impressed. MGA is always good with doll clothes but it's possible that the Rainbow High has the best clothes I've seen on playline dolls, including Bratz and even early Monster High. I mean... pockets are real pockets. There's a ton of fine detail on these clothes, but the one that blows me away is that the boy doll has both hip and back pockets that the doll can actually stick his hands into. AND THEY COME WITH 2 SETS OF CLOTHES, INCLUDING SHOES. And they're only 26.99, which is $2 more than OG Monster High were back in 2013. I don't really know how that's possible, but you are definitely getting a lot for your money.
I really like the boy doll!
The girl dolls are... shiny. I've never liked shiny dolls. I like a bit of shimmer, but the girls make me think they've had their faces dipped in doughnut glaze. Super shiny.
There's NOTHING WRONG with shiny. I mean look at her, she shines. It looks nice, it's a current makeup fad, it's just one of those things that people either like or hate.
Their bodies are pretty amazing, too.
I designed some for my own dolls with the focus on getting an authentic looking result and people freaked out and begged me to make a pattern. And so here we are, 7 years later!
It always bugged me that my original pattern didn't have the same format as my other patterns but I didn't want to go down the rabbit hole of constant editing. But this was my *very first* pattern, so I can make an exception, right?
The pattern sheet has been redrawn to make it easier to cut, I added new instructions and lots of pictures and a bonus dressing section because over the years about 90% of the questions I got about this pattern had to do with dressing, not sewing. The fit though, I didn't mess with--that was perfect.
Some things are just worth doing twice :)
]]>And I wanted to squeeze one.
So here we are!
*Ahem* Na!Na!Na! Pom Surprise dolls are another new line by MGA of Bratz fame and more recently LOL Surprise. MGA is not afraid of innovation, and is pretty on point for spotting trends.
Pom dolls combine a few recent trends. They're generally referred to as plush fashion dolls but that isn't exactly true, they're more of a hybrid with a cloth cover over a hollow vinyl head and either firm foam or vinyl over foam body, which gives them the plush look with a little bit more articulation/uniformity of a vinyl doll. They remind me a bit in this regard of Santoro London's Gorjuss doll line of articulated vinyl with a plush aesthetic.
The 'Surprise' part comes from the blind box trend. It isn't a fully blind box: there are little stickers with a symbol on the box so if you look up the doll key on their website, or have one from another doll in the series, you can tell which doll you're getting. This seems like a good way to make sure your kid gets the surprise they want without tipping them off that it isn't just luck. They also have a cute balloon and confetti popping gimmick to open them, enhancing the surprise part. Presentation is important!
Finally the body is more chibi than fashion doll: big head, short, pear shaped, thick limbs. This has been a trend for some time in dolls, fusing the exaggerated pear shape starting in artist BJDs with anime chibi aesthetic seen in action-figurey type dolls like nendoroid. This hit mainstream fashion dolls with Pure Neemo and Obitsu in Japan years ago.
/end educational blurb
Now one of the things that kept me from getting another LOL Surprise fashion doll was the bad quality control. Eye wonk is nearly universal. I expect some eye wonk, but I'd totally be the person comparing 3 different dolls in the store to see which one was wonk I could live with. Surprise dolls means surprise wonk. And, eh... we got some issues.
Aspen Fluff was the worst of the two. The vinyl(?) shell of her head under her cloth skin came out of the box with dents. Her hat was also sewn on in a way that the back of her hat/hair wefts were turned up and couldn't be flattened against her head for a natural hair fall.
I fixed her dents by heating up her head with a hair dryer on high heat and a bit of patience. This is a well known trick for restoring misformed vinyl to its original shape, I've been using it since my MLP days!
The hat twist/wig thing was more of an issue. I fixed it sort of by seam ripping it free from where it was sewn to her head, but even then it wasn't great. She had some cut plugs on the front of her head that make her already thin hair even thinner. I think most of the dolls have curly hair to disguise the thinness as their 'wig' is only a single line of weft.
Not sure if I'll make her a full scalp or just give her hat better wefts from some of the hair I have lying around (<-another one of those things you really can't say to non-doll collectors without them thinking you might be a serial killer), but it lies a bit flatter on her head now that it's no longer sewn on.
Misha Mouse just had a really asymmetric hairline. Her hair half covers one eye and barely covers the other ear. I turned up the hat brim and saw... more cut plugs. I think in this case she was originally sewn with too much on the other side and whoever cut it back probably should have only cut like 2 plugs vs 6.
But this was a really easy fix. I took a couple of plugs from the 'too much" side, pulled them across the forehead to the 'too little' side and sewed them into the hat brim where the cut plugs were. The pulled across section forms a loopy bang bit. It actually came out super cute, now she looks like she has the hair style of her cartoon avatar:
So cute!
And really, these are not huge issues. It doesn't require you to acetone and repaint bits of your dolls face like eye wonk does, the fixes I did were all pretty easy and could be done by anyone. It's still wonk, and made my immediate reaction be "CU-WTF?" instead of a straight "CUUUUTE" but obviously I am a doll collector.
Quality: 4/5
Now that I've covered quality, let's get onto the fashion part of fashion doll:
These dolls are 5-point articulated just like the original Barbie for dressing/posing purposes. That's where the comparison ends. The limbs can turn, which means the arms go up but not out, and the legs go um, sideways, but they can't sit. The articulation is so bad I kind of wonder why it's there at all. The soft limbs bend great, which is what makes them easy to dress far more than articulation.
Can Pom dolls share clothes with anyone? Here's the obvious comparison:
Definitely not with MGA's other major fashion doll line, LOL Surprise! Noooooooooope.
But as I squished that cute little body in my hands it felt familiar so I tried on some of the clothes I've made for my 'Chibi' size dolls, which include KikiPops and Realfees:
Now we're getting somewhere!
There's a little bit of weirdness in the shoulders because the underarm is at the same level as the underbust (vs overbust on most other dolls) but it's more of a 'could be fixed with an alternate cut line' issue vs a size-breaking issue.
Let's see now the numbers line up:
Pretty good! It's not even the outlier, it's closer to Realfees than KikiPops are.
I will take a picture of these dolls side by side but the other two currently have their heads off for new faceups so any picture I took would be a bit...unsettling.
Final Thoughts:
These are really cute! I didn't bother to mention things like the excellent clothes (always a MGA strong point) as most reviews cover that kind of stuff. It's waaaaay better than anything I've seen in a playline for years. Their underwear is printed on and themed to each doll,which I usually hate but since they have cloth skins, their cloth undies look right. It's also the smart choice because given the dolls are so small all over, non-printed socks would be super chunky, and this allows for them to look like they're wearing elaborate layered clothes without the bulk. The clothes that are sewn are well designed for the small size and have a good composition of color and texture--Aspen Fluff even has a puffy jacket with actual puffs!
These will be very easy for the customizing-curious to get their feet wet. The wigs are a strip of wefted hair sewn into the rim of the hat, all the faces are the same (so no real pressure to make a unique face) so sew up a hat with some hair trim and a little outfit and you've got a whole new character. Nothing hard like painting, dremeling, or even popping off heads!
The only think I'm kind of eh about is that all the girls do have the same face. Come on, they each get individual themed screen painted undies, but nobody gets a different makeup or expression? A smirk? A winky face? Something? Without more differentiation between them, you can't really get more than a couple without them all kind of looking the same.
The aim of the Level Up patterns is the same
To teach people a useful and fun skill that can be done at home with/without kids and on a budget! I can't go back to the original plan of just making them free for a couple reasons: it really messes up my accounting (as in, all the extra blank orders make my admin time go from 'a couple of hours' to 'days'), and being able to offer free patterns here but not on Etsy makes some people extremely angry.
Here's why it isn't an option on Etsy:
I can't. Etsy has no 'free listing' option. It does have minimum item fees, so you can't list something for a really low price like .01, either. If I did that, I'd owe Etsy a LOT more than .01 each time someone got a pattern.
Nor can I write "Go to my website for everything in my Etsy shop, cheaper!" in listings. It is against their terms of service. It's like if you went to the grocery store and the apples had stickers that said 'come to our orchard and save!' I can (and do) suggest people come here to look at the free sewing tutorials, but that's it.
The new plan:
Instead of a 0 listing price, I'm making a coupon code on RequiemArt.com for a free pattern in the freebie section and adjusting the listing price to match Etsy. The result is still 0 (free) but it will reduce confusion.
I'm hoping this will reduce my admin work to something I can handle since it should cut down on the 'I don't even sew for that doll but it's free so why not' orders.
If this goes well, I will cycle other patterns I feel are useful through the freebie section. That way, if you didn't use the coupon code on a Level Up pattern, you can still use it and have a little something to look forward to. We all need that :)
This is something that is both easy and hard. It's very easy to explain, and very easy to understand, but especially when you're working with the smallest of dolls, your fingers need to get what's called 'muscle memory' to be able to do it well so it can be frustrating for newbies!
First I'm going to run down the list of different types of closures and the pros and cons.
Closure Type |
What it's good (and bad) for |
Thick Velcro |
Pros: Easiest to find, can be cut to size, lets you adjust a closure slightly more/less to fit doll body variations |
Thin Velcro |
Pros: Can be cut to size, lets you adjust a closure slightly more/less to fit doll body variations, no thicker than snaps. |
Snaps | Pros: Come in different sizes, can take the most 'pull' before coming undone. Cons: Need to be sewn in by hand, takes longer to sew in than hooks. |
Hooks | Pros: Needs the least overlap, can be placed to have a perfectly flat edge-to-edge closure. Cons: Comes undone very easily, hard to position just right, needs to be sewn by hand. |
Zippers | Pros: Gives a smooth closure with no overlap Cons: 'doll sized' ones have such small parts that they break very easily, and replacing them is almost impossible. Even the smallest doll zippers are relatively chunky on dolls smaller than 1/4 scale. Very hard to sew in. |
Buttons | Pros: Can look the most authentic in scale. Cons: Tiny buttons are easy, button holes are the problem. Buttons work in situations button hole stitching isn't needed: a non-fraying fabric, or if a button-and-loop closure is used instead. |
Frog Closures |
Pros: So pretty! |
As of the time I'm writing this there's only one pattern out of about 300 that I give instructions for with an optional zipper (1/3 Super Stretch), zero with actual buttons and zero with actual frog closures. If you want the look of buttons and frog closures, those are best done with clever fakery (you sew them on and stick the closure elsewhere).
Tiny zippers and buttons can be done, but I recommend them only on art dolls that will rarely if ever be redressed. This is because they damage very easily so if you're taking them off/putting them on, it's more of a matter of 'when' not 'if' they will break. When they do, replacing them is very difficult or impossible.
For most of us, velcro, snaps, and hooks do great. They take being done up and taken apart very well and can easily be replaced or repaired if necessary. Clothing closures for all 3 are set up the same way, just with a little more/less overlap depending on the closure.
So let's get to it: First, put the clothes on your intended doll. Fold under the edge that will be the 'top' (doesn't matter which side, I just go with whichever looks nicer). Pin it closed to simulate how it will look when the closures are added.
(pins recolored in red so you can see them more easily)
You want it to align roughly with the spine. You can also do it a little to one side so that the closure (velcro, snaps, hooks) will sit on top of the spine and be centered.
Once you get it nice and straight and smooth, check the fit:
Not every piece of clothing will have the same fit, some are designed to be tight and some are designed to be baggy. They key is you want it to look the same all over. No spot where it's tight vs the rest being baggy, no lumps, no wrinkles.
If you need to adjust the fit, take the pins out and try again. When the clothes look nice, you're done.
Mark where your closures will go in. For example, I'll take a fabric marking pen and put a dot on the inside of the closure on both sides where a snap or hook will go, or a straight line if I'm sewing in velcro to mark where I want the edge of the velcro to line up.
Remove the pins, take the clothes off the doll. Hem the edge of the side that will be the top and sew in your closures--if you're doing velcro, you can hem and sew in at the same time.
Wait, wait, not done yet. I have one more tip for this Materials Monday!
I love thin Velcro, but it's a PAIN to get my hands on. There is a kind of thin velcro you can get everywhere, but it's got glue on the back. In a pinch, you can still use this stuff, IF you use it the right way.
The trick is, you can't sew in glue-gummed velcro. It'll mess up your needles and your machine if you try. You need... MORE GLUE!
Specifically, this stuff:
Or possibly another brand of clear fabric glue. If you want to know more about fabric glues, read this article.
You'll want to smear a thin coat of glue all over the glue already on there. This glue is chemically similar enough to the stuff already on there that it bonds instead of just sits on top of it and separates when force is applied, which is what would happen if you used, for example, white fabric glue. So if you do this and the stuff isn't sticking, you probably used a chemically incompatible glue.
Unlike the other closures, this works best if you do it on the doll.
Trim your velcro pieces to an appropriate size. One big piece is rarely the way to go, I like to use multiple small pieces to keep clothes flexible. How wide you want your strips to be will depend on the doll size. In Monster High and Barbie dolls I usually use about 3/8" wide strips, in 16" and larger dolls I use about 1/2" wide strips. If you're not sure, check them against the doll to make sure.
Take the velcro apart and carefully apply a coating of glue to the gummed side of each velcro section and place in the closure.
Be careful to make sure that when you put the other side of a velcro section in that it lines up exactly with the side you already have in. This is more important than exact placement, because the glue is still sticky. That means, once you have all of the velcro parts in, you can slide them around a little bit until everything is smooth and perfect, like so:
So flat. So smooth. The perfect closure <3
Once everything is perfectly in place, pin the closure shut. This is to hold everything in place while the glue sets. DO NOT REMOVE THE CLOTHES UNTIL THE GLUE IS DRY. If you do, you'll just rip the velcro out and have to do it over.
After the glue is dry, take the clothes off. I often find that the corners of the velcro need a touch up of glue because those are the places your fingers are most likely to take the glue off as you're applying it. You can touch up glue by putting a drop of glue on a pin and applying it anywhere your initial gluing didn't take. Once any touch-up glue is dry, you're done!
]]>
However, with the pandemic and a sudden surge of people sewing stuff, my local usually well stocked fabric store is pretty much bare. I couldn't shop local if I wanted to. So here's some tips on shopping online:
First, the more info a shop provides about the fabric the better. Ideally, you want:
Here's a screencapture from Fabric.com. I'm not getting paid by them or anything, this is just a good example of a fabric listing that has everything I look for:
Now obviously you want to see the fabric before you buy it. I don't need to explain that. Some websites put a coin in for scale but that isn't really ideal. I'll hold up a ruler and enlarge the fabric on my screen until I get a good match to get an idea of whether the print will be in a good scale for dolls.
The second part is the fabric type. Most websites will have this info also. "Quilting Cotton" is my go-to fabric for most patterns because it's the most common/easily found fabric. Therefore, whenever possible, I make sure a pattern will work well with that weight.
BUT NOT ALL QUILTING COTTON IS EQUAL.
If you're sewing for a bigger doll, like a 1/4 or 1/3 scale, this next part is not as important, but if you go for 1/6 or smaller, it becomes super important, and I'll show you why:
These are the stats from two different fabrics in my last fabric order. Both are quilting cotton, both are in the 'lightweight' category, but Fabric A is about 20% lighter than Fabric B. Heavier weight means thicker fibers which means a stiffer fabric. I can use Fabric B for Barbie Dolls, but it only works well with fitted clothes, like a pencil skirt. Fabric A though, can be used in gathered clothes like a cupcake lolita skirt AS WELL AS fitted clothes.
Moving up to 1/4 scale, Fabric B could be used in a gathered skirt. It will still look stiffer than Fabric A in the same style, but it will work and not look wrong.
Get up to 1/3 scale, if I make the same gathered skirt out of both fabrics, Fabric A might need an underskirt to look full, but Fabric B won't.
If you can't find exact weight, look up the brand and fabric type and try and find it on a website that sells the same brand/type. Usually all the quilting cotton from Company A will be the same weight, the variation comes more between companies.
Both are cotton so share similar qualities with other cotton fabrics (non-stretch, will take a crease, doesn't fray easily) that makes it good to use for dolls, but if you look at the weight you can see they are even lighter than quilting cotton.
If you're looking to get a selection of solid fabrics to keep in your doll sewing stash, 'voile' is good. It's not expensive, and performs well in both gathered and fitted styles at all sizes. It comes in prints and solids and varies from sheer to opaque, and some of the higher end stuff has a nice sheen to it as well.
Gauze is a good fabric for clothes with softer looks. Quilting cotton and voile are tightly woven which makes them smooth and crisp. For styles that look lived in (ex boho/hippy type styles with flowing blouses and skirts) gauze will do well. Gauze also performs like a silky when cut on the bias (diagonal) as the loose weave will stretch over contours for a fitted cut without needing to sew darts.
Knits are for your soft, stretchy clothes: t-shirt, tunics, turtlenecks, leggings. Stick to things in the lightweight or very lightweight categories, and if the weight is given, lighter is generally better--unless you're going for a miniature sweater look!
Silkies are the hardest fabrics to pick out online because weight isn't necessarily related to stiffness, and it really helps to be able to see the cut edge to get an idea of how fray-prone the fabric is. For example, I just tried to find some light taffeta, but out of a full shelf of maybe 20 bolts of fabric that could all be described as 'light taffeta' only about 4 bolts were soft enough for doll clothes and low-fray enough for doll clothes.
Fortunately most doll clothes patterns that call for a silky can also use voile. Nice voile can even have a bit of a shine, so especially in the 1/6 and smaller sizes, voile will give you at least as good of a result and be much easier to work with.
]]>If you've ever sewn a quilt, you've done this before. Take a square, split it into four squares, add seam allowance and sew those squares together to make the big square, but with 4 pieces. Super easy, but, like most things, only after you know how to do it!
Doing it with clothes is just as easy, only you don't start off with squares. Here's a quick guide I drew up:
...Yep, that's it. Cut up, add seam allowance. Precision is key, but if you're used to sewing doll clothes, you're already better at precise sewing than most people!
And of course you can add more than 2 colors, but the more seams you add, the more bulk you add so you have to be careful not to do too much color blocking on small dolls. A stripe of contrast will usually work, while making a miniature version of Joseph's Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, not so much!
The bigger the doll, the more seams and thus the more color blocking you can do without risking making the clothes too thick and stiff.
]]>During that time I gave away:
6289 patterns total! Woah :D
But the downside is, it's made my accounting much, much more difficult (averaging 75 orders a day, but only about 6 a day that don't have a $0 balance) and made it much harder to spot messages in between the order spam.
I've had a lot of good feedback on these patterns, so while my original plan was to make them regular patterns after the pandemic lockdowns ended, I decided to keep these free-ish. I'm changing them to free with purchase, so you can pick up a free pattern with a paid pattern. Otherwise, they're 1.99. And yes, you can buy Level Up! pattern for 1.99 and get another Level Up! pattern free :)
This will go into effect at the END OF THE WEEK (6/5/2020) so if you were procrastinating on free patterns for the last 3 months, do it now!
]]>I know I'm in a better situation than most. I also know the reason for that is pure luck: every other job I've ever had in my life would either have me laid off or working in high risk situations. So for everyone who is doing those things right now? I empathize. A LOT.
I'm not a thoughts and prayers kind of girl. It's fine if you can't do anything else, but those situations are rare. You can rarely fix things, and often not help in a big way, but you can almost always help a little. Do that, then thoughts and prayers afterwards!
So, this time, like every other time something bad happens, though maybe on a bigger scale than usual, the thought on my mind is "What can I do?"
The most obvious thing was using my experience using respiratory gear (thanks to years of using dangerous chemicals safely while customizing) with my experience in making fitted patterns to get good info out about masks that people who specialize in sewing OR safety equipment but not both might miss. Sure, it's a doll tutorial, but dolls are handy tools for learning all kinds of things: you practice first aid on dolls, for example.
This also got me identified as an early resource to start sewing masks to help with the local shortages (still doing it!) which has been eating up a lot of my doll pattern development time, so pattern releases have been erratic.
After a little while though, mental health needs attention too. This is why I've been trying really hard to keep up the doll stuff, not just for all of you, but for me, too! Dolls help me de-stress.
All hobbies are escapism, an essential for mental health in stressful times. Before books, movies, when you had a hard time you'd escape to the activities you loved. Bob Ross knew this, which is why he wanted to teach the world to paint happy little trees.
I'm not gonna say sewing will make everyone feel better. Painting happy little trees doesn't make everyone feel better, either. But I do recommend that everyone learns to sew at least a little just like everyone should be able to cook a little, or use a hammer, screwdriver, and drill. Worst case, if you don't like it you will still have a very useful new skill.
It's not just for making clothes (I don't). If you can sew, it only takes a few minutes adjust clothes to fit you better (hems!) or fix that favorite item when it needs a new button, zipper, or has a little tear.
I also use sewing to build things: at my D&D group, the guys bring their dice and minis in nice-but-large-and-heavy boxes. I have a 100% sewn bag with rigid, stackable fabric compartments using interfacing. The fabric lid to the compartments even flips over and becomes a dice tray! Weight? 2oz, and it takes MUCH less time to make than a wooden or metal box.
It's also one of the CHEAPEST hobbies you can pick up: a basic sewing kit with a few needles and small spools of thread are often found for under $1 in places like pharmacies for people who need to fix something in a pinch. Every house has scissors. Need fabric? I bet you have something in your closet that you don't wear that's too worn out to donate.
TLDR; Once you learn to sew, you find uses for it all over the place. It's cheap, makes your life easier, and lots of people find it FUN!
Therefore, as long as we're encouraged to stay inside, I'm giving away patterns to teach people how to sew. You can find them all in the new "Freebie" Category
(more to come!)
And yeah, they're doll clothes. Sure, doll clothes are my specialty, but even if they weren't I'd recommend them for anyone interested in learning. When I was 7 I learned to sew using doll clothes. Not because I was into dolls--weirdly enough, back then I HATED dolls--but because they're easy, fast, and can be hand sewn from scraps of fabric that would otherwise be thrown away. Kids have learned to sew with doll clothes for those reasons as long as there have been dolls.
Adults may not be into dolls (or action figures), but the other things still apply: it can be done with scraps, it can be done in the fraction of the time a 'beginner' adult project like a pillow or a human T-shirt can be hand stitched. And let's face it: you're not going to use your first pillow or first T-shirt either, so you might as well do something that takes less time you won't feel guilty about not using. Bonus points if there's a kid in your life you can make happy in the process!
]]>
I started last week thinking "Wow, there's a lot of bad mask instructions online for people wanting to sew masks. Maybe I can help by getting some good info out there to counter the bad."
I started this week with my latest batch of (human) masks for my local hospital.
So, how did I get here? Well... there was the doll masks, obviously. There were a lot of well meaning people making essentially cosplay mask tutorials that I knew would be ineffective from my own experience using PPE. I thought I could do a fun free pattern/tutorial to get some good info out there.
In my current job, I'm quite good at designing form-fitting patterns (obviously!) but in my previous job I was very good at research. So combining my past and present, I skipped all the helpful-but-bad youtube videos and went straight for the science articles. That's why my doll pattern ends with a lot of links on research to the best kinds of fabric to use, etc. The kind of hard science people should look at!
I finished that up and put it out for free on Wednesday, sending it to family and friends as well as you all.
By Thursday, HOSPITALS all over the country started asking for home made masks to cover shortages. Masks went from 'maybe a good idea to know about' to 'national shortage' overnight.
On Friday, through the folks I'd sent my mask tutorial to, I was asked to help out people at our local hospital as they are already running out/rationing and most of the staff has to go without masks of any kind. Not donating directly to the hospital (yet) but the hospital doesn't tell the staff they *can't* use cloth masks, so for now they're being passed around like contraband.
Just think about how messed up that is for a minute before moving on.
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(Reconfigured for mask-making)
So that's what I'm doing now. I had plans to do a lot of doll stuff to keep spirits up among adults and kids stuck indoors, and I still do--I'm just going to be making that priority #2 instead of priority #1.
If you're curious why the design is different from the doll pattern, it's because my original design was perfect fit to each face masks which don't work in a mass production setting. I'm using a tweaked version of THIS pattern because it's a multi-face surgeon style mask WITH a nose clip AND a filter pocket.
I have made some adjustments to streamline the making of it, but the main difference is the kind of tie used on the doll pattern was more comfortable and better at adjustable sizing than elastic ear loops.
For fabric, I'm using my fold-out guest bed's sheets because according to This new research bedding and T-shirts are recommended for best filtration/comfort. Bedding stood out to me as the best choice because high thread count sheets (like 600+) sheets are excellent, tightly-woven cotton, which take cleaning methods that destroy other fabrics (boiling, bleaching--the kinds of thing you'd do to sterilize, btw) and stay soft and strong. Certainly better than anything I could buy at a craft store!
The filters are the tough part. Per the above article, most of the good filters are really hard to breathe through, so I looked for an alternative. After some more research, CSR sterilization wraps seemed like a good choice: they're melt-blown fabric made for similar sterilization purposes by the same method as surgeon masks, just not pleated up into mask form. To check, I chatted with an ICU person who confirmed that CSR sterilization wraps are made from the same stuff as surgeon masks.
Even better, CSR wraps also provide really useful moisture barrier that cloth masks are lacking, which was noted as a drawback to cloth masks in a few of the studies I read.
So why not just make masks out of CSR wraps?
Couple good reasons: it takes me around 30-45 minutes to make a mask, which only makes sense if it's reusable (CSR wraps are not). Also, a lot of fabric is wasted in the folding/pleating/loop attachment. In normal circumstances, that's fine, but every square inch is precious right now.
Therefore, I bought a box of wraps and will be cutting them into smaller squares that will be used as disposable filters. This allows for the same amount of wraps to be used in roughly 3x as many masks and no wasted time!
Again, this is my personal MacGuyvering experience. I have no idea how well this will work compared to the proper protective equipment our medical people SHOULD have, but I do know it will work better than what they are currently getting.
If you are also currently in the process of trying to make masks to make up for the SHAMEFUL lack of protective gear they have, I hope sharing my experience is useful.
If you're interested in putting your sewing skills to good use, here are some of the DIY mask networks that have already sprung up:
www.providence.org/lp/100m-masks
https://maskforce.org/
https://turbanproject.com/
In times like this, I think it's important to think "What can I do to help?"
Everybody usually has something. I am pretty good at making things out of fabric. I've also been using safety gear for over a decade to protect myself from eye and respiratory damage from hobby stuff. Because of that, when I've seen pictures of people on the news wearing N95s upside down, half-tied and hanging loosely, or just not using the nose clip and I cry inside. If a mask is supposed to filter air coming in or going out, it doesn't work if the air is coming and going out the sides, bottom, around the nose and not THROUGH THE MASK.
At the same time, I've seen lots of people online, many with no sewing knowledge, trying to figure out how to make face masks. I've seen lots of people trying to be helpful with patterns and videos of how to make face masks that are, well, bad. Really bad.
We don't have one-size-fits-all clothes for our bodies for a reason, and that's we're all different shapes and sizes-including our heads! SO! Here's a free pattern to teach you how to make and fit face masks.
...For dolls.
Well, for the above reason I just explained. I don't think sticking a face mask pattern out there is a good idea because people will just cut, sew, and go. Then they might feel like they're protected and do things they might not have otherwise like go visit their grandparents. That would be a bad thing.
It's more important to understand how a mask needs to be put together and how to adjust the shape to get a good fit. Masks that don't fit don't filter.
For THAT purpose, dolls are great: their faces vary even more than human faces in shape and size, so the differences in patterns is exaggerated and more obvious to someone trying to figure it out. Since they're tiny, you can refine your mask making and fitting skills by making doll masks much faster than if you were practicing on human masks.
Plus, it's an easy project even a kid can do that might make them feel more in control by letting them protect their dolls, having a friend who 'matches' or just general roleplay to work through things.
While everyone is stuck indoors, I'm going to be adding a lot more stuff to help us keep ourselves and the kids in our lives entertained. AND since a lot of people are on shaky financial ground right now, I'm going to add more free projects, so check the new freebie section often!
Enjoy, and stay safe everyone!
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OMG dolls are the older sister/fashion doll counterpart to the cute little LOL dolls. They're made by MGA, who have made a bunch of very nice looking fashion doll lines (Bratz, Witchez).
The doll I grabbed is "Royal Bee" who has nice spiral curls and we all know (or should know) by now how i feel about dolls with short curls ;) Hair is consistently curled and of the same length, which is often an issue I see on curly haired dolls but don't see here, so I'd give her hair an A.
Faceup is more of an issue. Her left eye is noticeably bigger than the right one. This isn't a matter of the paint stamp being slightly twisted, it's bigger. The upper eyelashes come up higher as well as the white going down lower. This is a not so great thing because problems like this tend to be much larger scale quality control (QC) problems than the occasional doll that has her eyes stamped half way down her cheeks. I'll probably dip a tiny paint brush in some acetone and see if I can clean it up to make it more presentable. C for QC problems, would have been an A otherwise as the design is good work otherwise.
Body is good! MGA lines have usually been less about realistic bodies and more about stylized bodies, and this doll is no exception. Articulation at the usual places (hips, head, shoulders) as well as elbows and wrists with bonus removable hands. Can't say how much I love that removable hands have become an industry standard. Oh, and the hands have tiny adorable manicures <3
The only thing I don't like is that the dolls do not have any knee movement. I kind of expected knee articulation, and some prototype images have the dolls with crossed legs in a way that suggests articulated knees as well as the stand comes with a seat that would look amazing if the doll could sit on it properly with bent knees. Knee movement would make them perfect, and I really hope that future lines come with knee articulation. I'll give the body a B.
Edit: I've been told the body is supposed to have clicky knees, so I re-checked the doll I have. One knee can be bent back if I am VERY forceful (I previously tried to bend them with the same force I would have a Barbie with clickly knees) and it kind of stays bent, but it's only about 10 degrees of bend. Other leg can be force bent but does not stay bent. So I have no idea on the knees. I'm going to still hope for jointed articulation in future lines.
Clothes are great! Not quite the level of the legendary Bratz, but I don't think we could return to that without a significant bump in doll prices. Clothes are made from synthetics with a pretty good plastic %, but they are also soft, flexible, with sewn on details and vary in texture (ex the 'leather' jacket is vinyl, the pants are a mesh) which makes the overall outfit look really nice. Could they be nicer? Sure, but again, the quality for the price point is excellent. Definitely an A there.
Packaging is something I usually don't consider. Sometimes I rave about it (like the SDCC She-Ra box that contained a small castle that doubled as storage) but usually it's just the barrier between me and the doll. The packaging of OMG dolls is... fun. It's really weird to say that. You pop a plastic strap that keeps the box closed and the inside slides out. Inside is the doll in her underwear in a little dressing room. Her clothes come in tiny paper garment bags and the accessories come in tiny hat and shoe boxes (the sticker on the shoe box informs me she is a shoe size 6.5). Taking her out and opening up each of her little clothing/accessory bits and putting it all on her was fun. My inner environmentalist weeps at all the extra packaging BUT at the same time most of the packaging is cardboard and paper, not plastic so even if it isn't recycled it's majority biodegradable and therefore possibly better than a standard plastic clamshell box. So A for packaging!
Overall this is a cute doll that is well made. I hope it sticks around!
Now here's the bit that most people who read my reviews are most interested in!
The OMG body doesn't match any other fashion dolls I've measured. This isn't a surprise. Wide-hipped bodies haven't been in style all that long, and the early ones in western fashion dolls (Monster High) were also ultra skinny. The 'not ultra skinny' fashion doll is an even newer thing, and the number of dolls that are both is 3: Curvy Barbie, Wild Hearts, and now O.M.G. dolls. And since they're all pictured up there, it's pretty obvious that they all have very different proportions.
IF I were to do a pattern size for this doll, it would be "Petite Curvy" because her height range puts her in the sub 11.5" dolls (Petite) and her body shape is curvier than the average fashion doll (Curvy).
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Fortunately, from a sewing perspective, while there are a lot of different bodies here, they aren't all that different!
Here's a breakdown of the smaller-than-Ken-doll-boy-dolls currently made by Mattel. On the smallest end, we've got Monster High, who is the only boy doll in this picture who is in 'Slimline' boy pattern size. Everybody else: Reboot Monster High, BTS, Ever After High, "Slim" ken and the new "Original" ken are all 'Medium' boy pattern size.
The picture speaks for itself: Reboot MH boys and BTS boys have itentical body sculpts, right down to the molded on details of their underwear. Both are slightly smaller but very similar in sculpt to Ever After High boys. "Original" Ken is extremely similar in sculpt and proportion, but 108% larger which is why patterns work if enlarged to 108%.
The only doll that looks different is Slim Ken, but only because he is sculpted smooth, vs with all the extra cut-aways that would give the appearance of muscles/less body fat. Remember, dolls aren't like people! Adding muscle just means that someone sculpted muscles, not that the doll worked out and gained muscle mass.
There is a little bit of variation in the Monster High Reboot/BTS/Ever After High/Slim Ken set. EAH and Slim are sliiiighly thicker.
Not enough to keep them from sharing pre-made clothes, or even make it obvious that they are not wearing clothes that were not made for them, though. They all fit, just sit a little snugger/looser depending on if you're going from the smaller MH Reboot/BTS to the slightly larger EAH/Slim ken or vice-versa.
As always, this is even less of a problem for handmade doll clothes because the velcro/snaps/etc you sew in are always fitted per the doll you're sewing it for, so you always have a perfect fit!
Final Aside: The BTS dolls aren't different enough to warrant their own review, BUT they are very nice. Hair, faceup, and body are all well done, with the body plastic feels like a denser/sturdier version of the MH Reboot body which is an improvement as that body feels kind of flimsy/cheap. The only downside is the awful plastic clothes but... hey, when you sew that is the easiest problem to fix ;)
]]>Now, I (and plenty of you reading this) probably think 'more like not enough patterns!' and that is also true. There's always room for more. But like my overflowing fabric stash, there comes a point where 'a good, well-organized variety that always lets me find something I need quickly' becomes, well, an episode of Hoarders.
Pixels don't take up physical space, but over the last year I've been getting pretty regular questions from customers asking about a pattern that they can't find. The patterns are there, but they can't find them in the wall of patterns crowding their eyeballs. And those are the people who are so determined to find it they're sending me a message which means that a lot more people are having the same problem and just giving up!
So that's the problem I'm going to try and fix. It might seem like removing some patterns will do the opposite effect, but unless you're trying to make a very specific cosplay outfit, there are a lot of patterns that fill the same needs: we've got MANY different kinds of casual dresses, MANY different kinds of lolita dresses, MANY different...renaissance costumes (4. That's a lot for something so niche, yes?).
Therefore, for most people having a couple of options for something they like is more than enough to give them something to sew while waiting for other things they also want to come back into stock. I'm not sure exactly how often I'll switch out inventory--I'll rely on feedback from all of you to figure out the happy space between 'too often' and 'not often enough.'
There are also some patterns that are truly unique and don't really have any equivalents, like Basics Jeans & T-shirts and weird fashion fan favorite Kigurumi. Those won't be going anywhere! And new patterns, of course, won't be added to the rotation until they've been in stock for a while.
And finally, there will always be exceptions! A couple of times a year I'll put all the patterns back up for short periods of time. VERY short periods of time. And, if for example there's a customizing contest going on in the doll community that people can't wait for specific patterns to come into stock, I'll be willing to put together special orders if you send me an email. The whole point of this is to make things easier for my customers, so why would I not :P
This week's Materials Monday is all about fabric glues.
Eeeew, glue? No nice quality clothing was ever made with GLUE!!!
I get that a lot. And I understand--I wouldn't glue my own clothes. I need to wash them, and wear them around with lots of leg and arm moving. And most of all, I don't need to use glue because all the things I'd glue are big enough to easily sew by hand or machine.
But NONE of those things apply to doll clothes.
Doll clothes you may need to wash, in certain unusual situations. If so, it's best to wash them by hand and for hand washing, fabric glue is fine. It's waterproof after it dries, but soaked in water for 30 minutes and then shook around in a washing machine, bits would get ripped off more easily than if they were sewn on.
Everything else, not even a little bit. Dolls don't even need to walk down a runway. They might sit or be posed, but they don't move and it's the moving that puts the most strain on fabric.
A lot of things that fabric glue works best on: round hemmed necklines, for example, are straight up impossible to sew as neatly in miniature. Too small to use linings and have an invisible hem that way. Have you ever tried to sew a visible hem on something the size and shape of a coin and stay a perfect, tiny distance from the edge?
HAhahahahaha... oh boy, memories. Memories of wanting to sew my sewing machine out the window.
Here's a quick reference for the right way vs wrong way to use fabric glue.
1. Use a very small amount. Dots work better than a line, because dots will remain flexible for a soft hold which is especially great with stretchy fabric. If you use too little, you can always add more, which is a much easier problem to fix than too much.
2. Never apply your fabric glue directly to your fabric. Clogs, air bubbles, etc. You have much less control over your glue, and you're more likely to accidentally squirt a huge blob all over your outfit, which would ruin it. Squirt the glue onto scrap paper and use a toothpick or pin to pick up dots of glue and apply to fabric instead.
3. Apply to the edge you're going to fold over. This is because glue CAN stain, if you use too much. If you apply it to the edge you're going to fold over and it seeps through, no big deal. Remove some of the glue before you fold it over. Problem solved.
Clear glue. This stuff has the consistency of glue gun glue, except it's cold and takes a little longer to dry. This stuff is not water based so it doesn't seep in to fabrics. It is the best glue for synthetic fabrics and silky fabrics that stain the most easily. My favorite brand is Fabri-Tac, but there are many others.
White glue. This stuff is like a thicker version of craft glue that dries more quickly. This IS water based, so it will seep into fabrics, but unless you're working with a silky fabric with a sheen, once it dries it won't leave an obvious stain. It stains silky fabrics because it leaves areas that it is applied to matte. This is best for natural fiber fabrics like cotton, muslin, etc. My favorite brand is Liquid Stitch, but there are many others.
Glue Stick. Not a fabric glue, but still useful in sewing. Quilters, especially people who do applique quilts, use this stuff all the time. It's great for holding something in place that you can't pin in place to sew. It does not leave fabric stiff or stained, and you can completely remove it with a little hand wash if things go wrong. Any brand should do.
Fray Block aka Fray Check aka Fray Stop, etc. Also not technically fabric glue, more of a fusible. You apply this to the edges of cut fabric to keep it from fraying. It does not work as well as a serger, or even zigzagging the edge of fabric before you hem it, but serging and zigzagging edges is something that rarely works well in miniature. When sewing with a 1/8" seam allowance, fray block can make the difference between clothes staying together and seams pulling apart. Any brand should do.
All 4 of these things have different uses and should be in your miniature sewing toolkit.
Back in the 1960s, Mattel came out with Barbie fashion packs for kids to put together themselves, but no needles or sewing skills were involved. Instead, Mattel included glue strips for kids to use on everything.
I don't quite recommend that. When it comes to using glue in doll clothes, I ask myself a simple question: is the thing I want to sew functional (as in, holds things together) or ornamental (as in, makes things look nicer)
Seams are functional. Hems are not. Hems make things neater and keep edges from fraying, but it's an aesthetic choice. Attached ribbons, buttons (ones that are not used with buttonholes), studs, and other decorations are also ornamental.
The only exception to this is if the clothes I'm going to sew are going to be given to a kid. In that case, I sew anything that can be pulled off by small yet surprisingly rough hands. But even then, I'm only sewing on things like bows, but still using fabric glue for hems.
That's all for this week's MM! I hope you have been convinced that glue is a tool that will let you make nicer looking doll clothes.
]]>Wait, what about the assembling it bit?
Watch Danny's video. Yes, it's long. Yes, you should still watch it. I watched it when it first came out, before the dolls were even available to buy. I had it on in the background while I sewed. I got my cortex kit about a month later, and popped the shell together over the skeleton for a dry run (as in, no glue) in about 15 minutes. It was very easy, because I had watched the instructions.
And yes, you should DO A DRY RUN. Some of the bits can be a little tricky to fit together, and you obviously want to not be fiddling around trying to get them to match up while there's glue all over the place. Put pieces together, take them apart, put them together again. Can do it smoothly without having any bits catch or not want to go together? Then it's time for glue.
Like I said: this week's blog post is about assembling the shell with the goal of hiding the seams. I was pretty sure I knew how to hide the seams like someone had in the 'seam hidden' demo doll Danny showed in his video. I thought it would be a matter of using plastic cement to fuse the seams together, then just sanding them down and maybe applying a little filler and touching up hairline cracks.
That's pretty much exactly how it went when I used the bust to test this method (because I bought a soft bust since the hard bust limits posing).
The seams were still visible, but they were only as visible as the mold seams on the doll itself. Fantastic!
Unfortunately, the rest of the doll didn't work out quite as perfectly. But I'll get to that later.
Here's the stuff I used:
The main problem was that Model cement worked great on 2-part molds that pressed together in a straight line (the bust, the torso) but NOT on parts that had a panel (upper and lower legs, upper arms).
These seams didn't work well with the cement because the panel slides into the main part. If you press one side tight enough to get a fuse that results in almost no visible seam, the other side is going to have a corresponding wider gap. It took me a little to figure out that was what was going on (vs me not pressing the right way or hard enough) and naturally, most of my best fused seams are on the inside. Sigh.
TIP: When you use Plastic Cement, DO NOT WIPE SEAMS. If you get little beads of cement squeezing out between your seams, it's fine, don't touch them. It's plastic-melter. Only put it on things you want melted. Wait until it dries, then scrape it off with a razor blade.
After the plastic cement was applied I filled the big gaps with Mr Surfacer. Remember, if I did this again I'd just use multiple coats of Mr Base White, which has a finer filler. That's because color matching over white is easy, color matching over white and dark gray mottled together, not so much.
So just pretend this picture is layer 1 of Mr Base White.
After this dried, I sanded everything down smooth, and applied Mr Base White to everywhere the Plastic Cement hadn't fused a perfect seam and on top of the gray filler, and then sanded everything again.
Unsanded on the left, sanded on the right. So much sanding. So much. By the way, I spread these steps over a week and it was still brutal on my hands. I do not recommend doing this all at once.
Next was the painting and... honestly? I became pretty disheartened at this point.
Let me explain: The bust had come together perfectly. I had barely needed to paint, and what paint I did apply was put on hairline cracks, which are pretty easy to match/blend. The body, totally different. Instead of hairline cracks, I have gaps up to 2mm wide with irregular edges.
I COULD have airbrushed the seams, which would have made them virtually invisible to the camera, but that's really not what I wanted to do. Airbrushing is very fragile, even under layers of sealant, but the bigger issue is this:
Plastic is semi-translucent, just like real skin. Paint is not (or at least it's not when it's thick enough to wholly recolor something vs tinting). Paint reflects light differently too, so what might appear to be a perfect match in, say, white light, is obviously not a match in warm, yellow, incandescent light. The bigger the area you paint, the more obvious it becomes. Hairline cracks, you can get away with. 2mm gaps, no.
I've customized hundreds of dolls and done some really crazy things with paint. I can tell you that when it comes to painting the skin to match the the plastic, if you want a perfect match in all light, it's all or nothing.
Paint is a last resort. It will make the skin flat and less luminous and super, super easy to damage. The whole body becomes one big cheek blush waiting for a rub. Painting Cortex, which already scuffs just from handling, is something I did NOT want to do.
So here's what I did do: I used translucent paint and pastels to make the fillers less obvious without having to coat the whole doll. It's not perfect, it kind of looks like what happens if you have someone covering up a scar or tattoo with makeup. Better than no makeup, but not better than no scar/tattoo.
First I painted, applying paint over the seams with a brush to bring the white up to match the skin. Second, I blended the opaque seam to the translucent plastic on each side with a sponge. Third, I applied a coat of MSC to the whole body so that the surface of the doll would be uniformly matte. Fourth, I added flesh-toned pastels over places that were still obviously painted, Fifth I applied more MSC.
Some Blythe customizers have used plastic shavings dissolved in acetone to create a putty that they use to build up areas. The acetone evaporates, leaving the plastic solid again, working a lot like Plastic Cement. The same method might be usable to fill gaps in Cortex instead of Mr Base White, though customers don't have an easy source of extra plastic. Inside the bust, the pieces that you cut out could be used, but I don't think it would be enough to fill all the gaps. By the time I did 3 dolls though, I'd probably have enough scrap plastic bits!
I have mixed feelings on Cortex. It was the most enjoyable model I've ever assembled, and it needed far fewer adjustments than any other model I've worked on. It's really well engineered, and comes together both aesthetically and functionally.
As a doll though, cortex is lacking. I'm not even talking about the seams. She could be totally seamless and she'd still fall short compared to both her vinyl and resin counterparts because of the soft plastic used in the shell.
If you've handled one, you know exactly what I'm talking about. If you haven't, let me put it this way: in Danny's video, he smooths down bent plastic bits on the shell with his soft cotton rag before assembling. The shell is literally soft enough to be dented from rubbing with a cotton rag. Dressing causes scuffs. Handling causes scuffs. EVERYTHING short of 'looking at it' causes scuffs.
To prevent staining, I can pop on some stain protecting underclothes on the vinyls and not have to worry about it. Scuffs...? MSC wears off, attracts dirt, and over time can discolor. Plus, aerosol sealants aren't fool-proof: if the temperature or humidity is slightly off, it will dry with a white film. It's not a great solution. Neither is having to use a sanding sponge every time I touch/pose/dress her. The plastic is pretty thin already, and a sanding sponge will only wear it down more every time it's used.
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