Rescuing What's Her Face

I rescue dolls and give them new wardrobes before passing them on to kids in need. Some dolls require more than I have time to give them, and land in the Someday box.

Someday arrived for the 9.5 inch What's Her Face doll, who came with a plastic mask and tiny stamps for features, and a wig that Velcroed to her head. The mask was easy to lose and hard to use. When positioned through holes in the mask, the stamps created blurry features. The Velcro on top of the head sometimes came off with the wigs. The dolls and their hair ended up in  Goodwill stores everywhere. Mattel ran them 2001-2003, replaced them with Wee 3 Friends in 2004-2005.

What's Her Face is a delightful sturdy doll, well balanced, the right size to hold. I'd like to see this style doll body used more. It has a preteen body, allowing it to wear some Barbie skirts with its vintage Skipper-sized shirts.* Mattel used the same body for Wee 3, cute big footed friend dolls. I dunno, Mattel, why insist that people buy three of a doll? This is somewhat balanced by shoes that fit the doll and help her to stand. Wee 3 Friends used What's Her Face's body and shoes, and the hair was less flyaway than the wig hair.

Later, Hallmark used  the body style for a reissue of  three Rainbow Brite dolls. The sporty little soft dolls look like outer space aliens when rendered in vinyl. I'm not thrilled with the texture of the hair on these. For more on the reissue of a 25-year old franchise, go to rainbowbrite.net

I thought I should be capable of painting dot and line features or suggestions of features, as Eden did for its Madeline series. The wrong end of a paintbrush made a dandy circle for eyes. I drew on mouths with a pencil and painted over them with  acrylic paint. After a few days, I subjected the paint to a blast of hot air from a hair dryer. Amazingly, these two still had their (clunky) pink sandals when I found them. I'm a long way from an being an expert painter of doll faces, but this is better than blank doll heads.

Kids want doll clothes. They may comb hair, mess with stamps for eyes and other features, but they want clothes.  If Mattel had paired with a pattern company, the dolls might still be in production. Kids tired of the way she looked. A set of simple shapes would produce jackets, dresses and skirts, and could be made from felt by the child because the doll's breasts were just suggestions. Extra clothing for the doll was gimmicky reversible separates from tricot and vinyl. See the doll with purple hair? She's wearing a reversible tricot outfit. The gimmicks helped kill the doll.

At 9.5 inches, this doll seems both taller and heftier than the 9-inch vintage Skipper, Barbie's little sister. She can and does wear clothing made from patterns for Skipper, with just a seam's width added to the bottom of the bodice front,back, and at the side seam. A wraparound skirt meant for Barbie works. For pants, I added length to a pattern meant for 8 inch chubby Ginny. Yes, I can draft my own patterns for doll clothes, but I'm not above taking shortcuts. For kids, it's more important to have several pieces that the doll can wear than to have that one perfect outfit.


* If you have lived in a vacuum since 1959, you may be unaware that Mattel's buxom 11.5 inch Barbie and her  preteen 9-inch sister Skipper might just as well  rule the world of toys and dolls.