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Items for Sale
Photograph Doll- Call/E-Mail for quote
In the 1940's, Photographers would go door to door and offer to take pictures of children, concentrating on getting a clear photograph of the child's face. Some photographers would advertise in magazines. They then would send these photographs out to a cottage industry, where the women would sew a very simple stuffed oil cloth doll and instead of painting or embroidering a face, they would paste the photograph of the child on the front of the head. The women would, again using a photograph, reproduce an outfit the child had worn; sometimes using some of the original materials from the outfit if it was available. At times they would just make a simple outfit a child would have worn according to the styles at that time. I first saw an example of these dolls when a friend, who collects antique dolls purchased Photograph dolls at an Antique Auction in the United States. I thought these dolls were so very interesting and what a nice way to display a picture of a child. I wanted a similar doll. A few months ago I made my own photograph doll of myself, using a picture taken when I was 4 years old in 1946. The picture had been taken by a professional photographer in black and white, then send out to be tinted, this explains why the picture seems to have been taken in colour. I used the picture of my face, then glued it to the face of a stuffed cloth doll I made. I then reproduced a little winter outfit I had worn when I was at that age. The style is older then the mid 1940's when I wore it, it was originally made for my mother when she was my age. It was made of pink woven wool, lined with pale pink silk, the leggins rose up to under the arms, for warmth in the cold New Brunswick winters, the hat and coat were trimmed with white rabbit fur . I wore little white felt boots with black felt soles and I had my mom's little white fur muff, I also had on a pair of white angora mittens. Even though this little doll is not a sculpture, and sculpted dolls and figurines are my passion, I had taken it with me at an Arts and Craft show I was attending. A lot of people enjoyed it very much and she did get quite a bit of attention. To my surprise quite a few people asked me if I would take orders to make similar dolls of their children, so I took orders and decided to offer them for sale on my Web Site.
The doll can be made from a picture of a baby, toddler or child. girl or boy. The body style will depend on the age of the child of course. I can reproduce the clothing from an old picture you have, use your original material from an outfit, dress, suit etc, or I can purchase new material, for the clothing. The cost will depend on the size of the doll, how intricate the style of the clothing is, if the material old or new is supplied or if you prefer that I supply the material. A COPY of a Professionally taken photos is the best to use, but copy of a snapshots can sometimes be used. I would have to work with it to find out. If you are to take a picture for a child now, then it is important that you take a good picture ( digital or other) of the face and shoulders straight on. If you will notice in the picture I used of myself, my head is slightly tilted down, that has to be used as is and cannot be changed, which would be the case when using older existing photographs.
Although I do not do anything physically to the photographs I want you to send me a duplicate photo in case it should get lost in the mail. You may e-mail me for a quotation, giving as much detail as possible therefore, , size of the doll, from 12" up to 21; type of body determined by the age of the child :- baby up to 1 year old, toddler 1yr to 2yrs old, child 3 and up, will you supply photo for clothes or style, will you supply the materials, trimmings, laces. Once I have the details I will e-mail you with total cost. |
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*All prices are in Canadian Dollars.
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