Flapper Doll

Finally back to dolls! I started what I hope will be a whole line-up of flapper dolls. This one is paperclay with jointed hip, shoulders, and knees. Her hair is mohair, which ended up just as wild and woolly as I was hoping. She sits well, if not exactly like a lady. Next stop, cocoon coat

Jane Eyre Doll

For Charlotte Bronte's Jane Eyre, I wanted to make a milliner style doll. A milliner doll is a doll with a paper mache head, hands, and feet on a muslin body. These dolls were sent by dressmakers in the mid-1800's to show the latest fashions.

Poor Jane Eyre, though, is but a governess. Her linen dress in simple and stark, though her wool cape is passionate red. She has a cotton petticoat under her dress. She can sit on a shelf, but I think she looks more tragic standing in her doll stand.

Hamlet doll

Hamlet - the second in my Shakespeare doll line - finished. The melancholy Danish prince is made out of paperclay over a wire armature. His clothes are Elizabethan, and of course they're black because he still mourns his dad. He holds Yorick's jestful skull as he contemplates mortality.

Alas, poor Hamlet. Flights of Angels. You know the rest.

Hamlet the First

I've started my Hamlet doll. Not Shakespeare's noblest character, in my opinion. His dad tells him right away, "Hey, kid, your uncle killed me. Get revenge, but leave your poor mom alone." So what does he do? He puts on a play, TALKS about killing his uncle, but instead picks on his poor mom ("Whoops. Sorry, Dad") and his poor girlfriend. Then he kills Polonius by accident, which sends Ophelia to her death. He then wreaks havoc at the funeral, and Laertes has to fight him cuz he's being such a tool. All this before he can kill his uncle.

If there weren't so many bodies piling up, it sounds a lot more like A Comedy of Errors than a tragedy. Hamlet shoulda stayed in school a little longer.

So, my Hamlet doll will reflect my feelings about this whiny little guy. (That's the other thing. What did whining and playing mad get him besides another Act to procrastinate?) I started with a big Styrofoam ball for the head which I carved into the basic head shape. I covered it with paperclay and put it on a wire armature. I'm going to paint the wood base black, I think.

Jane Austen's Emma!

My latest Jane Austen doll is Emma Woodhouse, the confused but clever heroine who knows that to be poor and unmarried is to be pitied, but to be well-off and unmarried is always respectable, and she happily belongs to the second category. The movie "Clueless" is based very much on Emma, and keeps all its humor and innocence. I like the movie, but I love the original.

My Emma is paperclay with viscose hair. Her pink cotton dress has printing of the novel Emma as its print. Mrs. Weston, Mr. Knightley, and Harriet Smith are all discussed in the print on her dress. She also wears little kid slippers, cotton bloomers with lace trim, and a handmade bonnet with handmade lace and ribbon flower along with a feather.