Doll Exhibition #2 : Barbie aux Arts Décoratifs

Last week i finally went to the big Barbie exhibition taking place in Paris at "Le Musée des Arts Décoratifs".

Even though the "Musée de la poupée" often takes Barbie as the subject of their exhibitions, it's the first time that it's taking place in a "big museum", so i was pretty excited, knowing that it would have to be great. And I wasn't disappointed!

I went with two close friends who also loved playing with dolls as kids... the more the merrier right?

So after getting our tickets, we find ourselves at a bottom of a stairs leading to a big Pink door inviting us to enter Queen B's world.

We are then directly immersed, as we are surrounded by recent Barbie dolls dressed by designers (photo above). The set up is beautiful as they light up one at a time.

The next room takes us back into time for a little bit of "history of the fashion doll through the years".

In the 18th century, the fashion doll wasn't a toy for kid. It was only a way of showing new fashion trends, with replicas of the latest dresses from Paris, for example. The dolls would travel to England or Russia so everyone at the royal court would dress like the richest women in France.

So only the outfit mattered, which explains why the dolls had strange proportions sometimes.

These fashion dolls stopped being produced when real flesh and blood models appeared around 1860.

The dolls faces got a bit more juvenile and their proportions got a bit more real. But in the 19th century they were still not quite appropriate for kids to play with. Too precious, too fragile, they're more of dolls to be looked at.

In 1873, the "unbreakable baby Jumeau" is manufactured with carton and wood to strengthen the porcelain.

People who couldn't afford them played with raggedy dolls. If they weren't as beautiful, at least they could be played with endlessly !

It's in the beginning of the 20th century that fashion dolls with the same size as our Barbie girl appeared. The fashion doll Lafitte-Désirat (made of wax, i think they are absolutely gorgeous) in the 10-20's and the dolls from le "Théâtre de la mode" in the 40's, for example.

Now it's time to close this chapter from the past and find out more about the one and only : Barbie !

We start the tour by a little explanation on where Barbie comes from. How Ruth Handler found out about Lilli on a trip to Germany, and got her husband and partners at Mattel to start producing similar dolls.

An interview of Ruth and Elliott explains the whole story from the creation of Mattel to the success of Barbie.

Bild Lilli / 1952 - 1964

Ruth and Elliott Handler

Mattel first successfull toys : Futureland Grand Toy piano 1948 - Uke-a-doodle 1947 - Tin music box carrousel 1953

After walking by the very first Barbie, we discover a panel of different dolls showing us the evolution of B's face and body through the years. From the 60's to the new Petite, Curvy and Tall ones.

Petite Blue Brocade, Curvy Chambray Chic and Tall White and Pink Pizzazz / 2016Turning around, we get a wonderful view on dozens of dolls from all time period, some of them standing next to a screen showing a commercial.

  

After finding out more about Barbie's friends (my pictures were way too dark to put here), the focus is on Barbie's career. In two big rooms are at least a hundred dolls showing us how busy and ambitious this gal can be!

Here we find : Barbie Rock Star/1985 - Barbie Pet Doctor/1996 - Barbie Fashion Editor/1965

I can't name the others sorry, too recent for me i guess.

Beautiful Barbie Astronaut from 1985

Barbie as a fashion designer in the Busy Gal outfit from 1960

Barbie as a business woman in two Day-to-Night fashion from 1984

In the background, two Barbies running for president in 1992 and 2000

And Barbie Artist obviously dressed as a french girl! from 2008

In the background, Barbie as a Basketball champion from 1998

The last room on the first floor is a presentation of how a doll is made. From the choice of fabrics for the clothes to the choice of hair, head mold and body, introducing the new line of Barbie fashionistas: Petite, Tall and Curvy

On the second floor, after passing a presentation of different types of Barbie boxes, we discover a beautiful diorama representing the creation of a fashion line, from the studio to the final runway show. I loved it! I really wish it was my job to do stuff like that !!

The next room is about how the creators of Barbies were influenced by pop culture: Film, Music or Tv series (From Superheroes to Elvis or Mad Men) or even history and religion (like the creations of artists from Argentina Pool&Marianela)

Other big influences on Barbie's creators and designers, apart from career, pop culture, princesses etc. are : hobbies, travel and leisure. Barbie likes to ride a bike, sail or ski, go camping, to the beach or to a concert. If some of the dolls make us dream of what we could be, these dolls gives us the opportunity to identify to Barbie and are great to play with and easy to invent story for. The rockers collection are definitely big favorites !

Finally the last segment of this wonderful exhibition is about the first and favorite passion of Barbie : Fashion !

Barbie's first job was fashion model, and many designers, from Chanel to Versace or Dolce & Gabbana have dressed her. For example in the 80's, Oscar de La Renta designed a whole clothes line for her and BillyBoy made two beautiful dolls.

But she also became an inspiration to them. In their adverts, displays or even fashion lines, the face of and style of Barbie always spoke to people in search of glamour.

So, this is by far the longest post i've made here, but it's also by far the best Barbie exhibition i've been to and it gave me lots of ideas for future posts. My friends and I stayed 3 hours there and it felt like 15 minutes!! 

I hope you get the chance to go and if not, maybe this "little post" will make you feel like you went!

By for now, take care ++

Doll Exhibition #1: Baby boom - French dolls 1960 - 1979

Hi all,

I realize i've been gone for a long time. Doesn't mean I've stopped collecting barbie dolls from the 80's, no way!

On my last post i've told you i've been trying to collect all Fashion Play barbies that were released in Europe, and that's what I've been doing! They're really hard to find and quite expensive, so, it's taking a while. But my collection is getting bigger and bigger and i hope i can show you all the Fashion Play dolls - and outfits - real soon.

In the meantime, we can talk about other dolls. Vintage dolls. I found a box full of toys i used to play with as a kid, and inside were also big dolls from the 80's and early 70's. They're much bigger than barbies, you know, the kind you use to pretend you're a mum… I will show them to you when i make good pictures.

But it reminded me i went to a doll expo last year and never put the pictures online. They were old french dolls from the 60's and 70's so i don't know much about them, but let's try to find out!

The doll expo was called : "Baby boom - French dolls 1960 - 1979".

In France, the major manufactures that were selling dolls were Raynal - Gégé - Clodrey and Bella.

Raynal was created by Edouard Raynal in 1932 under the name "Les Poupées Raynal". It became B.E.L.I.N.D.A. in 1957 but when Mr Raynal died in 1974 the company closed. In 1975 a new company called Jamarex was created and decided to produce dolls under the label "Raynal". The company definitely closed down in 1982.

On this first picture, you can see a Tinnie doll on the left. She was manufactured in France by Raynal in 1976, and could still be found until 1998. Of course she was manufactured by different companies through the years and even had a change of head mold in the late 80's. The one in the picture is a Tinnie by Raynal from the 70's.
If you wanna know more about this doll and if you can read french, here's a great website dedicated to Tinnie and her friends.
http://tinnie.voila.net/index.html

The other doll on the right called Swimmie is another product sold by Raynal. She was manufactured in 1979 but i don't know when they stopped producing her. She was made entirely in plastic and had articulated arms and legs that could move to make her swim by turning a mechanism on her back. (Here are some other pictures i found)

 

Here, you can see all the dolls that were manufactured under the license Raynal.

http://www.paramourdespoupees.com/t14239-PETITE-GALERIE-DES-POUPEES-RAYNAL.htm

Gégé was created in 1933 by Germain Giroud and was the biggest toy manufacture in France in the late 50's. They stopped making dolls in 1979.

The following dolls were my favorite of the expo! never saw them before but i loved the clothes and accessories. If the doll itself wasn't as pretty as Barbie, they were clearly an attempt to compete with Mattel.

The doll name is Mily and she was created by Gégé when Barbie arrived in France. Gégé decided to compete with Mattel by releasing on the french market their own fashion doll. She even had the twist and turn body before Barbie!

Two other dolls came with Mily: Jacky, her husband (yes Mily got married at some point! It seems she was a bit more stable than barbie who got dozens of wedding dresses without actually marrying ken ;)), and Baby, her little sister (which kinda looks like an old lady to me).
Unfortunately she couldn't compete with the giant Mattel and its marketing and Gégé stopped producing her after 1976. Ironically she is extremely valuable in America now and many collectors are searching for a Mily doll.

here you can learn all about Mily, Jacky and Baby (with many pictures too)

http://www.poupees-annees70.fr/crbst_30.html?id_album=10fvxkgc4r2p0oj&n_page_album=3

In the next pictures are dolls manufactured by Clodrey. The company was created in 1952 by Claude Réfabert. His dolls became famous when he made an elephant walk on one of them and it didn't break. Later, his daughter created Corolle, the famous brand for dolls.

http://www.paramourdespoupees.com/t6659-PETITE-HISTOIRE-DES-CLODREY.htm

When the movie Mary Poppins came out, many dolls were made after Julie Andrews character. Clodrey made their own, produced in 1966. You could find two different ones, the one i took a photo of, and another model (found the picture on the net).

Above Mary Poppins are two famous french character called Chapi and Chapo. They're from a short tv cartoon that was first released in 1974. They were manufactured by Clodrey the same year.

At the bottom of the picture is a toy representing Margotte from Le Manège Enchanté (The Magic Roundabout) made around 1964/1965.

Bella was created in 1946 by Lucie and Salvi Pi. Their most famous dolls were Cathie and Tressy  and are still very popular among the collectors. Bella closed in 1984.

Cathie was made by Bella from 1967 until 1984. When she was first released, Cathie was 44cm tall with straight legs and light make up. She then had three major changes during the following years. In 1969, Bella released a new Cathie with bendable legs and white tights. Another version was created with a lock of hair that could grow and retract with the help of a button on her back.
In 1972 the tights color changed for a beige tone and some special dolls were made with different hair colors. In 1975, the first black Cathie was created, her name was Candy. In 1982, Cathie got a hair cut and was sold with short hair.
The same year Bella was bought by Berchet and in 83 and 84 the doll was sold under the name Nathie. Her production stopped shortly after.

If you wanna know more about Cathie dolls, here's a wonderful website that will tell you all about the doll and how to restore it as well.
http://www.cathie.fr/

Tressy was an american fashion doll created in 1964 by Jesse Dean and his wife to compete with Barbie.
The first Tressy dolls were sold in France by Bella at Christmas 1965 under license from American Character Toy Company. In 1966, Bella bought the license from ACTC and produced many different dolls as the american ones. What made her special was that she had a growing lock of hair.

If you wanna know more about Tressy dolls, here's a web page with french and english explanations.
http://www.tressydoll.com/french-bella.htm

More Bella dolls.
If you wanna know more about Bella : http://www.poupees-bella.com/index.php?menu1=1

Other fashion dolls were Perle, sold by Delavennat and in this picture associated to Veronique and Davina "Gym Tonic" show. This doll was sold at the end of the 70's, early 80's.

Sylvie made by Joja was a barbie clone from the early 60's. This one is a bubble cut model but a previous model had a stripped bathing suit with a face looking a lot more like Lili (pictures found online).

I couldn't find much information about this doll.

That's it for the moment. I loved that exhibition because it made find out about dolls i barely knew about. And what i regret about the Barbies from the 80's is that their boxes aren't nearly as beautiful as the 60's ones. All those fashion dolls had really great boxes, i mean, that last Sylvie one is to die for!
There are more exhibitions to come at the Paris museum of dolls, and i will happily tell you about them soon.

meanwhile, take care. +++