Tonner City Girls

Another discontinued unsuccessful doll line, wow I really know how to pick them, don't I?

These came out in 2012, and "Astor" and "Basic Houston" shown above are the only dolls I have ever bought direct from Tonner (split shipping with a friend who was also buying some doll stuff). I also have the blonde one, "Brook-Lynn" (groan) and I don't have "Billy" the dark haired one because she was seemingly the most popular and thus the hardest to track down.

They're not quite 16" tall and have some nice if basic articulation. There is only one facial sculpt so yes they look a bit samey. The key thing is that they were meant to be sort of "starter collector" dolls, priced lower than the usual Tonner doll and aimed at The Youth Of Today. This did not work. Personally I suspect the price was just a bit high for what they were, because (as the Makies also discovered) parents base their doll-buying choices on the price of a playline Barbie.

But for me yes they were a gateway drug to Tonner proper. As you can see I sewed for them a bit, and I'd quite like to return to that some day because they do wear clothes nicely, but they're in a box somewhere unloved and naked and that is just sad. I think the idiosyncratic size of them put people off a bit, which is the same thing that puts me off sewing for them. They don't *quite* fit clothes made for other dolls, they need their own stuff and then only they can wear it. See also their shoes.

Also is it me or do they seem to have influenced the later Deja Vu line from Tonner? The slightly vacant expression, etc?

I like these dolls for the most part, I just don't seem to do much with them. Alas.

Doctor Who Dolls Mainly

DollyDaily has moved, which is about the only doll forum I frequent. Pictures of cool dolls! Omg!

Anyway, one of my recent doll purchases was a Thirteenth Doctor Who doll from B&M.

She is currently on sale for £5, down from the £20 I paid so you'd be getting a bargain there. B&M seem to have almost all the Dr Who toys these days, they're doing action figure sets as well. Anyway the doll is about 1/6th scale and comes with her sonic screwdriver. I am not generally a fan of plastic hair on a doll but I am not sure how well proper hair would have worked given how short and specific Whittaker's haircut is on the show.

My other Doctor Who doll is this one:

She is *not* the official Mattel Dr Who Barbie, she is a custom homemade version because the Mattel one was too expensive for me. She's a blonde Made-to-Move with a haircut (OBVIOUSLY the Doctor needs full movement in her limbs so she can defeat monsters) and some clothes I sewed for her. I used an Etsy-bought pattern for the t-shirt and used fabric paint for the iconic rainbow, but I had to make the trousers pattern myself and let me tell you that was a journey. I think it took three attempts to get to the final ones in the picture. The boots are from Cool Cat Collection and the colour is slightly off but I think they convey the general idea. The slightly shoddy braces are made from grosgrain ribbon and some hooks and eyes.

I finished her last year but she still doesn't have a coat because the idea of making a lined hooded coat is quite intimidating. I might just nick the B&M one's coat for her.

And here's the River and Missy Funko Pops. They are  the only Funko Pops I have. One was a present from a friend and the Missy one I got out of fangirl.

Tangkou Doll Nostalgia

Got my Tangkou dolls out the other night to look at them, they had been lingering in a box on top of the tall bookcase. I have Jenny Wonderpants (Chinese Girl), Minty Seadevil (The Gap Year), Lily Pancakes (France) and Flea (Aussie). I am not that keen on their bodies but they can be fun to dress and pose and they have interesting faces. 

What to do with them? Most of their clothes are from before I could sew very well and before I could make patterns, so their wardrobe could do with an update. I put Jenny Wonderpant’s hair in bunches because it’s no longer in  the stock style and there’s a LOT of it and it tangles easily. They could do with some more shoes, which I might do something about next time I have spare money. 

I did think about attempting to draw on their faces a bit, but they all look lovely to me as they are. Even the one with terrible eyeliner that I did with human eyeliner which I understand is A Bad Idea generally. 

They seem to have gone out of business a while back, the website’s been gone for ages but you can still get the dolls and clothes on ebay from either the original company or someone who bought old stock from them. They just never really caught on as a (much) cheaper competitor to Pullip and Blythe. 

Two posts in one day

This felt like it should be a separate post, so...

I have opened an Etsy doll patterns shop, which contains a total of one (1) items. Here is the link, though the only thing for sale so far is a loli-style Ellowyne pattern. I think it's fairly cheap, at least. I may add more patterns to it at some point, but that all depends on my sewing "journey" etc. Like I currently have a mostly-finished MtM Barbie hoodie pattern I'm working on but I don't know when/if I will ever get it good enough to put on Etsy. I've made that damn hoodie so many times already, you know?

Also I feel like I should apologise for my absence even if nobody actually reads this blog. I was on tumblr for a while and I'm theoretically on Instagram as well, but the latter doesn't really allow for posting Extensive Thoughts and I don't really enjoy logging in and out of various tumblr accounts and then forgetting the passwords for them.

I aten't ded

I find myself in a weird position where I know I want to sew but I don't know what kind of doll to sew for. I have too many dolls? No, I don't have too many dolls, there is no such thing as too many dolls. Dolls I have been liking recently include:

- Tonner dolls, mainly Antoinettes because I prefer that more "realistic" body to the very stylised Tyler shape. The size makes for a different sewing experience, with some things becoming easier at the slightly larger scale and some things needing more detail/work. Hemming ballgowns by hand is bad enough at 1/6, you know? The downside is the posability, which isn't great though the expressiveness of the faces makes up for that a bit.

- Ellowynes, which are technically not Tonner dolls somehow? These are probably the largest dolls I sew for, and I prefer the ones with inset eyes. I now have a Lizette as well, which is something I craved for actual years before I finally got one.

- Makie dolls may be no more in terms of manufacturing but I still enjoy sewing for them and dressing them in cute little outfits. Very expressive dolls and I have I think 7 and of those I designed 5 of the faces myself (the miserable ones, mainly). They might just be my favourite kind of doll, though obviously there aren't too many of them out there and they're no longer in production.

- Made-to-Move Barbies are also a favourite, for the stellar articulation. I have yet to get one of the Curvy ones, but I've seen one IRL and they look really good. The main thing stopping me is that would be yet ANOTHER size/shape of doll to sew for and I am already a bit paralysed by choice on that front. Very good for rebodying old heads, I have rebodied "Manuella" my favourite Barbie and shoved a couple of So-In-Style heads onto MtM bodies. Love the posability.

- I got my Tangkou dolls out last night and had a look at them, though the body shape is a bit funny and the articulation somewhat lacking. Good bobblehead dolls, though, with stronger features than Pullip and less hipsterness than Blythe. (I only like custom Blythes, in terms of looking at pictures of dolls. The stock ones are... kind of dull?)

Do you associate styles/fashion trends with specific kinds of dolls? My Ellowynes tend to end up either EGL or super-casual, as a for instance. I do want to expand their lolita wardrobe a bit, but I sometimes shy away from how much more fabric they need compared to Makies and Barbies.

Whatever Happened To The Makie Dolls?

A slightly sad thing is that I didn't post about Makie dolls here before they vanished into... America?? at the end of last year. I am gonna write down my knowledge of what happened for posterity and whatnot.

Juniper, my first Makie, arrived at the end of June 2015. She was a "Limited Edition" pre-designed Makie, but was soon joined by Willow, then Strawberry, Blossom, Jasmine and Ginger. Basically an overload of doll happened.

Mid-summer last year Makie Lab announced a (quite substantial) price-decrease, which went along with the phasing-out of 3D-printed bodies in favour of cheaper-to-produce injection-moulded plastic ones. There was a period of a couple of weeks where you could get a 3DP-bodied doll for the new price, leading to a rush of orders from the adult collectors. At the same time the pure white "frosting" skin colour (undyed printed bodies) went away because you can't dye the newer bodies anyway and they had never been as popular as skintones you might see on a human. 

I think it's probably significant that the Makies you see most online belong to adult collectors who valued the dyeability (is that even a word?) of the frosting Makies. Because I had always got the impresion on the internet that white ones were really popular. But apparently not.

Anyway, the price-reduction didn't really seem to make them more plausible as presents for children (compare it to a Barbie, because that's what parents probably did, alas) and as things progressed it seems it didn't help the company make ends meet.

Fast-fowards to the Christmas season last year. After a "fake sale" on Black Friday (free shipping over £xx which was always  there anyway), an actual sale on accessories followed allowing myself and others to get some wigs and shoes and glasses and so on for cheaper. Everything seemed more-or-less okay, with new staff being hired and promises of new wonders in the new year, and so Makie Labs closed for the holidays.

And never (to this date, at least) re-opened. Everything was being moved to America all of a sudden, the British staff were made redundant, vague promises were made about a return, but we're now a year later and nothing has been heard for some time.

Here is their Instagram page, behold the sinister abandonedness. The same lack of information continues through the rest of their social media accounts, and even the once-optimistic are starting to refer to Makies as forever gone.

I was not one of the ones left wanting more of these dolls, as I was fairly sure I had enough of them to be getting on with, but we were all left confused, befuddled, perplexed, etc, by the sudden vanishing and the lack of return "after the holidays."   I don't know what we can learn from all this, probably some cliche about how nothing lasts forever. 

So, that's what I know and remember. I hope this is of use to someone, anyone, somewhere.

Hi, I'm not dead!

I sort of forgot that I have this blog, sorry.

I have continued acquiring dolls and trying to sew for them. This latter pasttime varies in its results.

Since my last post here, the Tangkou dolls website has vanished, although the company can still be found on ebay. I suspect they have died a bit, which is sad. I liked them but I know they terrify some other doll people, and maybe that didn't work out in their favour.

Not dead is Tonner, who merged into Tonner One World, just about the time I was worrying about them a bit. (Endless sales, low-numbered editions not selling out, the Tonner Toys thing clearly not working out.) I hope they will stick around in this new form.

Anyway, I will try to remember that this blog exists.

Martha Jones is Dolltastic

New doll in the house, she is a Tonner Martha Jones from... 2007? 2008? (I feel fairly sure Martha was no longer on the actual show by the time this doll appeared, but I could be wrong about that.)

What put me off this doll for the longest time was the very pale lip colouring. I don't know why but pale-lippy-against-dark-skin only seems to work on humans not on dolls. Luckily though the contrast is not as apparent as the photos on ebay suggested, so I am glad I decided "What the hell I can always repaint maybe" even though I can't repaint at all. She is staying as she is, she is lovely.

Martha has the Tyler body, which is new to me as somehow I have managed to resist most Tonner dolls (I am sure that is about to change -- Martha needs friends!) except err the City Girls and the Ellowyne's from Wilde Imagination. I don't know how much she looks like Freema Agyeman but it's not a horrendous likeness (see the Tonner Tenth Doctor doll for a truly terrifying face). I am not good with faces, maybe she looks more/less like her to people who are not me.

Martha's clothes are also great, she wears stuff Martha wore on telly so that you know she is Martha not just some random woman. I was wary of breaking tiny zips so I didn't check if the jacket would close over her chest but it looked like it would be a tight fit. Despite years in the box I am happy to report that she is not stained/marked anywhere, though her earholes were not very keen on taking earrings and I didn't want to force the issue.

I wonder what she would look like with her hair down, but not enough to remove it from the Recognisable Martha Pineapple Hairstyle that she arrives with.

She is currently sitting naked on my desk as I procrastinate about making her an outfit. I don't have Tyler patterns yet so I shall be trying her out with other dolls' clothes and seeing it any of those patterns could be altered to fit her.

Oh, and the Tyler body is less extreme than I had thought it was, which is good to know. I always seemed to picture her with a scarily tiny waist and massive shoulders which are only a bit like that it turns out.

Monster High Jane Boolittle

Latest arrival is Monster High's Jane Boolittle, who apparently grew up in a swamp with two dads. Good for her. She comes with an unpictured pen/cane, handbag, and sloth. There seems to be some added fun where you write on paper with the pen and shove it into the sloth's back. Because you can put things in the sloth's back, as with real sloths.

I love her face, it's got attitude and prettiness in one.  She has lovely soft hair in a nice 'do.

I think the best part is that I want to keep her looking stock rather than redressing her, which is what I usually do. Oh she'll probably end up nekkid eventually, but her total look is just that good that I don't want to spoil it be removing too many bits.

I resisted Monster High for some time before I got one and then one became... about ten, I think I have now? I'm trying to stick to "no more than one of each character" but there are a lot of characters. like with Pokemons or something of that nature. I love the articulation and the attention to detail that Mattel have put into these things. This right here is what playline Barbie ought to be -- nicely articulated, not-always-pink clothes, and a barely-concealed demonic nature. They even come with stands (most of the time), ffs!

 

Yessss, after a while with no purchases I went a bit mad with a discount code on the Tangkou Doll site. I got the Aussie and France dolls, and a coat for them to wear.

"Aussie" is going to be called Flea, a name I chose when browsing dolls a while back. She wears a sort of weird hat-thing that isn't actually a hat more like a tube of fabric. She's got "furry" hair and the traditional four sets of eyes. 

"France" doesn't have a name yet, she too has "furry" hair and her hoodie is unlike the coat in that the hood will actually fit over her massive head. It's a design choice, and I wonder a bit that they share the property of hoodiness or otherwise. Oh, and her purple boots require the removal of her feet, which come in a wee plastic bag with her knickers. Yep.

Tangkou dolls are basically wonderful. You may recall (did I mention it?) that I prefer her to the bland-faced Pullips on which she is partly based. I do like large-headed dolls, I blame the fact that if I had a "companion doll" it would be Lemon the bitter-faced Dal.