Kim's House of Dolls

This site is devoted to customized dolls and my own efforts of customizing them. I usually purchase unfinished doll kits (under such brand names as "Dollfie") made by Japanese companies (like Volks) and I finish them by painting their faces, giving them a hairstyle, and making their clothes. The mainstream mass media sometimes refers to them as "anime dolls" because they frequently have the light skin, small nose, small mouth, and large eyes of characters in Japanese anime like Great Teacher Onizuka, Love Hina, Pokémon, Astro Boy, and Speed Racer. I sell many of my customized efforts on eBay. For more details about doll customization, check out both the Customized Doll Info and FAQ. For information on why this type of doll is so special and unique, check out A Comparison Between Articulated Dolls and Other Fashion Dolls. Visit the Doll Gallery to see all the dolls that I've personally customized as well as dolls that I have in my personal collection. If you want to know what I've been up to recently, check out the blog. If you're interested in buying one of my creations on eBay, click on the For Sale link to see what I'm selling at the moment. (Be forewarned that, from time to time, I also sell non-doll items on eBay.)

I've been told that I began to get into art soon after I learned how to hold a pencil in my hand. All I know is that ever since I was a small child, I've been doing something creative, whether it was drawing a picture in crayons or learning about embroidery or making a masterpiece in Play-Doh or wowing my art teachers in school with my artwork so much that a few of my pieces were entered into the local county-wide art show that was displayed in local shopping malls.

As an adult I've also done some creative things that wowed people. In 1999 I had one of my sites nominated for "Best Recreational Site" at the annual South by Southwest Interactive Festival. (I lost to another site but it was still a thrill being nominated in the first place.) More recently I've turned some of my creative energies towards customizing ball-jointed dolls that originally arrived as kits from Japan.

I first learned about ball-jointed dolls in a brief article in Time magazine about Super Dollfies in the summer of 2004. They sounded intriguing but the article claimed that Super Dollfies have been sold for thousands of dollars on auction sites like eBay. I did my own search on Google and learned that Super Dollfies are the largest dolls that Volks makes (they are 60 cm/2 feet tall, which explains why they are so expensive) but there are smaller dolls (such as Volks Dollfie Plus) available for far less. I learned that customizing smaller dolls is far cheaper than buying an already painted and dressed doll. Since I've always had an artistic bent, I decided to give customizing dolls a shot and found that I liked it, so I continued.

I've had an interest in dolls ever since I was a small child. Here is something I originally wrote for The Lunar Ark mailing list on August 22, 2004 when someone did a survey among the members on what was the first doll we've ever owned in our lives:

As a very young child I remember having generic baby dolls, although I've since forgotten their names or the exact details of what they looked like.

I began to collect Barbie and her friends when I started elementary school. The most memorable of Barbie's friends was P.J., who had her own battery-operated dancing stage and when I put her on it, she would jiggle back and forth. She also had more joints than the average Barbie doll. What's more, she came in an outfit that included a mini-skirt, go-go boots, and a vest with long fringes that made her look like Tina Turner when she was on the dancing stage.

At one point I collected other doll lines as well. There was Dawn and her friends, which were smaller fashion dolls. (I've noticed that the same www.doll-hobby.com that sells the Volks line also sells the recently reissued Dawn line.) There was a short-lived line of Barbie-sized dolls made by another manufacturer who had names like Love and Peace. (This was back in the early 1970's.)

There was also a line of dolls called Rockflowers that had a small doll dressed in wild hippie-style clothes and a plastic record that had two songs (one on each side) that were unique to that doll. Generally you took the plastic record and put it on the turntable. Then you took the doll, placed her in a small plastic stand, then take the stand and fit it into special grooves in the middle of the plastic record. At this point, you play the record, listen to the song, and see your doll turn around and around on the turntable.

I also had a larger doll named Crissy who wore a cute floral outfit. You could literally change the hair on the doll from short hair to long hair. (If you wanted long hair, you pressed a button on her belly and pull her hair. If you wanted short hair, you turned a knob in her back and the hair became short again.)

Sadly I no longer have any of those dolls from my childhood because my mother was the type who couldn't stand to have too much stuff accumulate in the house and if I didn't play with a toy for a certain length of time, she would give it away to Goodwill.

BTW, when I was in Borders the other day, I saw a book on the value of dolls from the 1960's and 1970's and I found that many of the dolls that I used to own now fetches quite a few bucks in the collectibles market. One of these days, I'm going to tell my mother that what she did with my doll collection was the equivalent of taking a bunch of hundred dollar bills and flushing them down the toilet. (LOL!)

I customized my first doll a couple of weeks ago. [You can see her on the left side of this web page.] She is a Dollfie Plus who has a Beauty A body with a Volks Custom Hair Head (with the A Face). I'm in the process of customizing my second doll and she also have a Beauty A body with the A Face Volks Custom Hair Head.

I also have a couple of other dolls, although my collection is quite small. I have a tall porcelain Little Bo Peep doll that I ordered through the Franklin Mint a number of years ago. I have a Gorby doll (yes, he's patterned after Mikhail Gorbachev) who opens his mouth and squeaks when you squeeze his abdomen. I have a bride and groom doll that my uncle had sent me from South Korea during his Army days when he was stationed there. I also have a Kim Possible doll that I bought mainly because it's not every day you see a mass-produced doll named Kim. (She's about the size of a Barbie doll.)

There are a few other dolls that I used to own as a child that I forgot to mention in my post. I once had a Holly Hobbie doll, who was a cute rag doll that was dressed in a pioneer outfit complete with a long granny-style quilt dress and a blue floral bonnet. I also had two other rag dolls—Raggedy Ann and her brother, Raggedy Andy. The one thing I used to love about them was the fact that if you lifted Raggedy Ann's dress up or looked down Raggedy Andy's shirt, you'd see a sweet secret. On their bare chests they had a small piece of embroidery that included the words "I Love You" encased in a small heart. When Raggedy Ann and Andy were re-released in stores a few years ago after a long hiatus off store shelves, I looked to see if they still had that secret heart. I'm glad to report that they still had that lovely embroidery so today's children can still discover that hidden secret.

I also had a line of dolls known as Upsy Downsy. There were two types of dolls in this line. Upsy dolls were rightside up like most people, animals, and things in real life. Downsy dolls stood upside down on their hands, which made them look wacky. Each doll in this line came with its own board that depicted its own neighborhood with sidewalks and streets. The board can hook up with other Upsy Downsy boards to create a complete Upsy Downsy land. I wanted to own every single doll in that line just so I could hook up all the boards together and create an ultimate fantasy land but my parents only bought a few of them because of 1) financial reasons (both of my parents worked and there were times in the inflation-prone 1970's when they were barely able to make the mortgage on the family home) 2) space reasons (the Upsy Downsys competed for space in my bedroom with my stuffed animals, Barbie dolls, Dawn dolls, World of Love dolls, Rockflower dolls, numerous board games, and other miscellaneous toys), and 3) they were always worried about me becoming spoiled so they took great pains NOT to buy me everything my heart desired. So I had to make do with the Upsy Downsy dolls that I did have and I still had fun with them.

In many ways it feels like my life has come full circle. I used to be into both art and dolls as a child and I'm now channelling those two childhood interests together into a different direction in my adult life.

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Site News

About This Site

About Kim the Artist



	Site News November 13, 2007: Come and visit my brand-new online shop. Right now most of my doll-related inventory consists of my thrift-shop-Barbies-turned-fairy-dolls but I do plan on carrying doll clothes in a variety of sizes in the future. I also carry a line of unique jewelry that you won't find at chain stores like Wal-Mart that could be a possible solution for those who are looking for an unique gift for the upcoming holiday season. Older Site News... About This Site This site is devoted to customized dolls and my own efforts of customizing them. I usually purchase unfinished doll kits (under such brand names as "Dollfie") made by Japanese companies (like Volks) and I finish them by painting their faces, giving them a hairstyle, and making their clothes. The mainstream mass media sometimes refers to them as "anime dolls" because they frequently have the light skin, small nose, small mouth, and large eyes of characters in Japanese anime like Great Teacher Onizuka, Love Hina, Pokémon, Astro Boy, and Speed Racer. I sell many of my customized efforts on eBay. For more details about doll customization, check out both the Customized Doll Info and FAQ. For information on why this type of doll is so special and unique, check out A Comparison Between Articulated Dolls and Other Fashion Dolls. Visit the Doll Gallery to see all the dolls that I've personally customized as well as dolls that I have in my personal collection. If you want to know what I've been up to recently, check out the blog. If you're interested in buying one of my creations on eBay, click on the For Sale link to see what I'm selling at the moment. (Be forewarned that, from time to time, I also sell non-doll items on eBay.) About Kim the Artist I've been told that I began to get into art soon after I learned how to hold a pencil in my hand. All I know is that ever since I was a small child, I've been doing something creative, whether it was drawing a picture in crayons or learning about embroidery or making a masterpiece in Play-Doh or wowing my art teachers in school with my artwork so much that a few of my pieces were entered into the local county-wide art show that was displayed in local shopping malls. As an adult I've also done some creative things that wowed people. In 1999 I had one of my sites nominated for "Best Recreational Site" at the annual South by Southwest Interactive Festival. (I lost to another site but it was still a thrill being nominated in the first place.) More recently I've turned some of my creative energies towards customizing ball-jointed dolls that originally arrived as kits from Japan. I first learned about ball-jointed dolls in a brief article in Time magazine about Super Dollfies in the summer of 2004. They sounded intriguing but the article claimed that Super Dollfies have been sold for thousands of dollars on auction sites like eBay. I did my own search on Google and learned that Super Dollfies are the largest dolls that Volks makes (they are 60 cm/2 feet tall, which explains why they are so expensive) but there are smaller dolls (such as Volks Dollfie Plus) available for far less. I learned that customizing smaller dolls is far cheaper than buying an already painted and dressed doll. Since I've always had an artistic bent, I decided to give customizing dolls a shot and found that I liked it, so I continued. I've had an interest in dolls ever since I was a small child. Here is something I originally wrote for The Lunar Ark mailing list on August 22, 2004 when someone did a survey among the members on what was the first doll we've ever owned in our lives: As a very young child I remember having generic baby dolls, although I've since forgotten their names or the exact details of what they looked like. I began to collect Barbie and her friends when I started elementary school. The most memorable of Barbie's friends was P.J., who had her own battery-operated dancing stage and when I put her on it, she would jiggle back and forth. She also had more joints than the average Barbie doll. What's more, she came in an outfit that included a mini-skirt, go-go boots, and a vest with long fringes that made her look like Tina Turner when she was on the dancing stage. At one point I collected other doll lines as well. There was Dawn and her friends, which were smaller fashion dolls. (I've noticed that the same www.doll-hobby.com that sells the Volks line also sells the recently reissued Dawn line.) There was a short-lived line of Barbie-sized dolls made by another manufacturer who had names like Love and Peace. (This was back in the early 1970's.) There was also a line of dolls called Rockflowers that had a small doll dressed in wild hippie-style clothes and a plastic record that had two songs (one on each side) that were unique to that doll. Generally you took the plastic record and put it on the turntable. Then you took the doll, placed her in a small plastic stand, then take the stand and fit it into special grooves in the middle of the plastic record. At this point, you play the record, listen to the song, and see your doll turn around and around on the turntable. I also had a larger doll named Crissy who wore a cute floral outfit. You could literally change the hair on the doll from short hair to long hair. (If you wanted long hair, you pressed a button on her belly and pull her hair. If you wanted short hair, you turned a knob in her back and the hair became short again.) Sadly I no longer have any of those dolls from my childhood because my mother was the type who couldn't stand to have too much stuff accumulate in the house and if I didn't play with a toy for a certain length of time, she would give it away to Goodwill. BTW, when I was in Borders the other day, I saw a book on the value of dolls from the 1960's and 1970's and I found that many of the dolls that I used to own now fetches quite a few bucks in the collectibles market. One of these days, I'm going to tell my mother that what she did with my doll collection was the equivalent of taking a bunch of hundred dollar bills and flushing them down the toilet. (LOL!) I customized my first doll a couple of weeks ago. [You can see her on the left side of this web page.] She is a Dollfie Plus who has a Beauty A body with a Volks Custom Hair Head (with the A Face). I'm in the process of customizing my second doll and she also have a Beauty A body with the A Face Volks Custom Hair Head. I also have a couple of other dolls, although my collection is quite small. I have a tall porcelain Little Bo Peep doll that I ordered through the Franklin Mint a number of years ago. I have a Gorby doll (yes, he's patterned after Mikhail Gorbachev) who opens his mouth and squeaks when you squeeze his abdomen. I have a bride and groom doll that my uncle had sent me from South Korea during his Army days when he was stationed there. I also have a Kim Possible doll that I bought mainly because it's not every day you see a mass-produced doll named Kim. (She's about the size of a Barbie doll.) There are a few other dolls that I used to own as a child that I forgot to mention in my post. I once had a Holly Hobbie doll, who was a cute rag doll that was dressed in a pioneer outfit complete with a long granny-style quilt dress and a blue floral bonnet. I also had two other rag dolls—Raggedy Ann and her brother, Raggedy Andy. The one thing I used to love about them was the fact that if you lifted Raggedy Ann's dress up or looked down Raggedy Andy's shirt, you'd see a sweet secret. On their bare chests they had a small piece of embroidery that included the words "I Love You" encased in a small heart. When Raggedy Ann and Andy were re-released in stores a few years ago after a long hiatus off store shelves, I looked to see if they still had that secret heart. I'm glad to report that they still had that lovely embroidery so today's children can still discover that hidden secret. I also had a line of dolls known as Upsy Downsy. There were two types of dolls in this line. Upsy dolls were rightside up like most people, animals, and things in real life. Downsy dolls stood upside down on their hands, which made them look wacky. Each doll in this line came with its own board that depicted its own neighborhood with sidewalks and streets. The board can hook up with other Upsy Downsy boards to create a complete Upsy Downsy land. I wanted to own every single doll in that line just so I could hook up all the boards together and create an ultimate fantasy land but my parents only bought a few of them because of 1) financial reasons (both of my parents worked and there were times in the inflation-prone 1970's when they were barely able to make the mortgage on the family home) 2) space reasons (the Upsy Downsys competed for space in my bedroom with my stuffed animals, Barbie dolls, Dawn dolls, World of Love dolls, Rockflower dolls, numerous board games, and other miscellaneous toys), and 3) they were always worried about me becoming spoiled so they took great pains NOT to buy me everything my heart desired. So I had to make do with the Upsy Downsy dolls that I did have and I still had fun with them. In many ways it feels like my life has come full circle. I used to be into both art and dolls as a child and I'm now channelling those two childhood interests together into a different direction in my adult life.