I don’t know about you, but when I come across a doll head without a body, or a doll body without a head, I feel an uncontrollable urge to connect some doll heads to those doll bodies! No doll body should have to go around headless, and no doll head should have to go around bodiless!
How do you feel about putting vintage doll heads on brand new doll bodies? What are your thoughts on re-styling a doll’s hair?
In the comments, please leave your tips, tricks, and methods!
Inevitably, when I find a dismembered doll at a yard sale or second hand store, her hair is in dreadful condition. I look online for some guidance, some of which has been helpful and some of which has led me down the wrong path altogether.
I’m told A Thousand Splendid Dolls has a very helpful channel for doll repair, and I’ve used her expertise from time to time. But whoever suggested that I create paper-straw rollers to make my Christie doll’s hair look naturally curly was full of horse hooey.
I mean, look at this mess!
They talk about “AI slop” on the internet these days, but let’s be honest…. Some of the “advice” real human people give you for doll repair and clean-up online is pure garbage too.
If people have an epic fail, like the Christie hair re-do that you see above, we probably shouldn’t be bragging about it online. It just gives people more misinformation to have to weed through, you know?
I’m not saying we have to have rules, when it comes to doll repair, but a little thoughtfulness goes a long way.
One of the reasons I’ve cut back on the number of blog articles I’ve been posting is because my father died in April. My head hasn’t been in the game for a while now, and my doll clothes patterns and projects have veered off into left field a little bit. I suppose it’s part of the healing process.
You might remember the blog post a couple of months ago that featured the image above. I typed up that blog post just as I was going to visit my dad for the last time. I took a long road trip after he died, and visited various places I’ve lived, trying to connect the dots of my life in retrospect.
So rather than keeping up with five blog posts a week, I’ve been limiting myself to two or three authentic, well-made pieces of information that I am sort of pulling out of old flash drives. These are projects I’ve put on the back burner for whatever reason, or like today, I’m just writing about a project that never surfaced at all because, well… the final product wasn’t wroth bragging about.
It seems like, since I cut back to two or three blog posts a week, I haven’t been hearing from my followers as much. But this community means a lot to me. So I really do hope you leave a comment.
I started today’s blog post with the following statement: “No doll body should have to go around headless, and no doll head should have to go around bodiless!”
Since my dad died, I feel like a doll body without a functioning head. Some days, like Christie, I walk around with my hair all out of whack, wondering why I can’t seem to pull myself together enough to design some doll clothes.
I’ve had fellow doll collectors cite rules from some imaginary “rule book” that says you should never connect a vintage doll head to a new body. But I’ve never been one to follow the rules, when it comes to my dolls. And right now, I’m just trying to get from one day to the next, hoping my hair is sort of in place and my head is on straight.
But I can feel a change coming on.
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Dear Chelly,
I am so sorry to hear about your dad. Mine passed away 30 years ago last month. As far as removing and replacing doll heads and bodies are concerned, I use a blow dryer to heat the backs of their heads and gently pull them off with a clean towel or cloth. Then I place the heads on the donor bodies.
Thanks for sharing today’s blog post,
Trisha
I hadn’t heard of using a blow dryer to warm up the back of the doll’s head. That’s genius! I need to give that a try…
Hi, I am very sorry for the loss of your father. I try always to read your posts and I always appreciate them, new or “recicled”.
About dolls’ heads… uh it is very difficult to find the right combination.
Once I have bought a doll from US like a Wendy but with bendable legs and she had 2 heads, one ponytail and one bubblehead.
I didn’t know that in some casse it was common and even I have discovered this, I felt the need to find her a body!
Since it was not easy to find the right body I chose to put her on a Curvy Barbie body, I had found one at a very cheap price and headless.
It was a dr Frankenstein work! The head fit well but the doll head a very terrible look. It looked like she was terribly upset and hated me! Like she was saying: I have never been so fatty in 60 years! You cannot make this to me. (And here I state that there is nothing wrong about a curvy body).
Every cloth looked wrong on her.
After 4 years I casually found a lot of 60s dolls on EBay with a suitable and very rare body. I was lucky enough to buy it, now she has found again her shape and I have found a lovely curvy head for the curvy body and now she too is looking great!
About hair, I have done some work but it is difficult. Only hair I have found available is for wigs not for rerouting and is a bit too sturdy at the end.
One I did is a Skipper, her hairs were terribly weird… I washed them but there was no way to comb them in any shape, so I cut them all and made her look like a Penelope Featherington’s sister with red curly long hair and she is finally lovely (but she is still waiting for her regency dress).
Now I have to finish rerooting a last doll for this summer and is a job I definitely don’t like.
Oh Marco! Thank you for making me laugh with “It looked like she was terribly upset and hated me!” That really put a smile on my face! 😄
I regularly swap Barbie heads onto more moveable bodies, but I’ve only just switched my first 1990s Christie head this week. Seems to fit well, so I see more on the horizon.
Christie has a beautiful face. I love that doll.
I think you can absolutely put a vintage head on a modern body. I didn’t know it was possible to reattach these types of heads. 🙂 She looks beautiful.
Thank you.
Thank you, everyone, for chiming in with comments. I can feel the community love pouring in, and I swear it’s improving my mojo!