I cannot stress enough how important it is to keep a Doll Book and/or a complete list of your doll molds! Those of you who teach doll making probably have an up-to-date Doll Book showing all the pictures of the dolls that your molds produce so you can show them to students to help them choose their next doll project. But what if you don’t teach doll making? Is this really important for you?
The value of Doll Books doesn’t end with the doll teachers. Everyone needs an accurate record of their molds. We all know that one doll body, whether modern or antique reproduction, may have multiple heads that fit it. At first it may be easy enough to recall which arms, legs, shoulder plate, or body goes with each head, but as we acquire more and more molds it gets harder and harder to keep track. And, trust me, it’s not just the number of molds that befuddles us, it’s that sneaky approach of our “Golden Years” that comes into play here as well. It may be that a year ago you could rattle off what goes with what at the drop of a hat, but the time will come when our brains are struggling so hard to remember who we are, where we live, and if we took our meds that morning that it clears out all that extraneous information like junk in a garage sale just to make room for the necessary information to just keep our bodies functioning. So it becomes a matter of writing it down, keeping a record, or forgetting it. Not there yet, well, trust me, you will be!
And, of course there is another major argument for the benefits of keeping up-to-date Doll Books that we try not to think about, like when we turn up our toes and go to the big doll factory in the sky. Then what happens to all our special stuff? If you’re like me, you’d want it to go to another doll nut who’s every bit the fanatic that we are rather than see it end up in Goodwill or the dump when our families have to deal with what we leave behind. Remember, they don’t have a clue about what our precious things are all about. You’ve run into these types of situations enough to know what I’m talking about. Someone runs an ad in the paper, or on Craig’s List, or contacts me to ask how to find a new home for mom’s stuff, and as much as we might hope to be able to pick up some more molds, wigs or whatever, they have no idea what’s there and so far I haven’t found a one of them who can come up with a Doll Book or even a mold list through no fault of their own.
So, start now. Get yourself a good strong binder and some clear vinyl sleeves to protect the pictures and get started! I prefer the binders that have the clear plastic pockets on outside so I can slip in an extra picture that I like on the front that will identify the book at a glance, and I add a label piece in the pocket on the spine that identifies it when I actually put it on a shelf. See, that wasn’t so hard, was it? But it gets at bit trickier from here.
New molds may come with doll pictures, or if not with the molds themselves, then with the body patterns. Or you may have some of the older doll mold catalogs from a few years back when they were notebooks full of 8” x 11” pictures of their dolls. Go through those, pull out the pictures to go with your molds and stick them in your fledgling Doll Book. Still don’t have some you need? Go through your old doll magazines. Back when the industry was really humming, the magazines were full of mold pictures to encourage their sales. You can scan these pictures and adjust their size to a full page if needed, and print them out. Or if you don’t mind pulling the magazine page out, do that and add them to your Book.
If you’ve exhausted your resources at home and still lack a few pictures, try borrowing them from friends and copy those. Or go to the sites of the mold companies that are still in business and download or copy pictures. You’ll find them listed in our Supplies Directory under Doll molds. Next, look up people who sell SFGW in the Supplies Directory under … you guessed it … SFGW! Many of them have pictures of the dolls. And, if all else fails, put out a plea to the doll boards on the net for help finding the ones you need. Lots of people on the boards will be happy to share, especially if you return the favor when they need something.
Sound too hard? Well, it’s worth the effort. And you don’t have to do it all in a day! Don’t forget to add the pictures you get with the new molds you’re buying as you go, and if you get second hand molds, ask for the pictures and body patterns. Hopefully the seller will be able to produce them for you.
I like to add a label down in the corner of the pictures telling what arms, legs, shoulder plate to use and what size wig , eyes, neck connector, and shoes the doll requires if that info isn’t already on the picture. That way when you go to pour the mold again, all the information for the doll is at your fingertips and you don’t have to dig around trying to find it.
