It's Not About The Fabric

I may have mentioned this before regarding a conversation I had with Robert Tonner years ago - possibly the first time I met him. I said, "I love the fabrics you use." He replied, "It's not about the fabric; it's about what is done to the fabric." By this he meant embellishment and draping.
Three days ago, we put together one of those Detolf Ikea showcases. I needed another to display my beautiful Tiny Kitty dolls who were all squished in with my Silkstones. That's definitely not a pleasurable way to enjoy a collection.
After arranging the dolls - many of whom did not fit anyway - I shot a few iPhone pictures some of which are below.
What does this have to do with anything? You know I'm going to tell you.
The reason I've been disappointed in several of the newest Tiny Kitty offerings become clearer when I look at my collection and compare.
Just look at the handling of the beautiful fabrics on these little dolls. 

I use risers to lift the back row of dolls but I ran out of them so most are on the same level for now.

The only way to fit these gals in was to sit them down.

This shelf has a combination of Silkstones on the left and Tiny Kitty plus Simone Rouge on the right.

On this shelf, all the dolls are in their original outfits except the far left.

The embroidery, the beading, the lace overlays, the full skirts, the pleating, the hats, purses and accessories...sigh. Gone. These dolls are rarely offered for sale anywhere and if they are, the prices are above the original retail.
You can find three of the new TKs in there. One is nekkid as I purchased her that way and haven't decided which of the many fashions I have she will wear. 

Her hair arrived with the forehead curl sticking out on the side of her head. There is no glue residue on her forehead. That's going to need a little fixing. I wonder if the seller noticed that before shipping.
This is the doll who was offered dressed in a glitter gown with glitter gloves and shoes. But she is also the first TK to have eyelashes. I wanted her.

If you want to see previous photos I've taken of Tiny Kitty with a real camera, just search the blog by entering the phrase Tiny Kitty into the search box at the top left of the blog page.

Tonner 2014 Mainline Release

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the television series entitled Big Bang Theory, I will explain. The character Sheldon is obsessive compulsive and when he knocks on his neighbor Penny's door, he has to knock three times and say Penny. He does this three times.
It has become a meme.

On to the Tonner release...

Here's Sheldon!

SHELDON COOPER - First Edition $149.99

Robert did a great job sculpting the likeness. It's one of his best ever! While it's not a doll I need in my collection, I think the price is right. What troubles me is the finishing of the clothing. It's one of those details that is important to me.

Anyway, a huge portion of this release consists of childlike dolls: Half Pint, who has the (annoying) Kickit's sculpt, Patsy and Patsyette. The Patsy and Patsyette are very cute and their clothes are adorable. I don't collect this type of doll.  I look at the Tiny Kitty outfit and sigh. If you know anything about sewing and fabric, you will agree that the wrong fabric was used for this gown. The gathering is awful. My Tiny Kitty collection is done. It ended with glitter and I doubt that anything will bring me back.
Here is a screen shot of the entire new release. 

http://www.tonnerdoll.com/2014-mainline-release

The Jon, Cami and Liu Liu are nice looking dolls but their fashions, if one can call them fashion, are ignorable. And the Party Stripes Cami...seriously...was she high already when she got dressed? A short lime green skirt and striped top is not fashion or fashionable. Who the heck signed off on that doll? She should have been sold nude or as a basic in a bodysuit.

New opportunities for "Who Wears It Better" have cropped up recently.

I think the 22" American Models are lovely.  I'd have to build another level onto my home to accommodate more of them. There have been many that are so gorgeous.  These two come to mind immediately.

But I digress.

It's a no-brainer that a manufacturer cannot maintain the same quality of goods as prices keep rising.
Lowering the quality is not the answer.  
Make it better and charge more.
Then sell the lower priced items as basics without stands, clothes or any extra doo dads. 
Refine the line.
There are collectors who spend small fortunes for beautiful dolls with fabulous clothing. I'm not just talking about OOAK dolls.

Angelic Dreamz Now Closed

The news that Angelic Dreamz has closed it's on-line business and it's brick and mortar store did not surprise me. George is not the type of businessman to just let the winds of change carry him away. He's a forward thinker who sees trends and does what he can to profit from them and/or in spite of them. JamieShow Dolls has had it's own website for a few years and the recently opened couturedolls.com will be selling select fashion dolls.

I don't know if Couture Dolls will be solely dedicated to selling Integrity Toys' products in the future. I hope not. Hopefully George has plans to grow this site.

One by one the brick and mortar doll shops have shut their doors. Angelic Dreamz was one of the prettiest stores I've ever visited. I wonder if George and Tim will rent it out to some other business.

Save the Date: Brighton on April 3, 2014

The second and highly anticipated resin BJD from Kingdom Doll, Nelson, goes on sale Thursday, April 3, 2013 at 6:30 PM British time. (No UTC/GMT offset) However, on March 30, Europe starts Daylight Savings Time so the time will go forward by 1 hour.  Believe me, I'm confused, too.
If you live in my time zone, this is what you would pull up:
 
Here is a link to a world clock for you to calculate what time it is in your own city when it's 6:PM in London. Make sure to use it after BST begins.

http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/converter.html

Now that time zones are out of the way, are you going to try for this beauty?

Alexandra sent me these gorgeous pictures.

No, the chair isn't included. It looks like the deck chair I have from one of Sandra Stillwell's events.

Brighton will be $675, she is dressed in wide legged trousers, her top is different from the FDQ cover as the actual fabric we used is Ralph Lauren tissue silk very expensive and gorgeous, she has a boating sweater, wood effect high heeled wedge shoes, a working miniature umbrella, a matching canvas tote with the KD logo on it with rope handles......inside the tote is a perfect miniature Luis Vuitton journal, a coffee cup, a chocolate bite, three vintage postcards from Brighton with a pencil and a small sea shell. (she also has a hand made hard cap wig by Ilaria.)

Introducing Black Vanessa

Her name is really "Second Skin" Vanessa. She's the first ITBE doll I've ever purchased. (Integrity Toys Basic Edition.) You may remember back a few short years ago when the first ITBE dolls came out, the dealers practically had to pay collectors to take them off their hands. You can easily see why.

IT has stepped up it's game. The general Fashion Royalty line, recently announced as discontinued, has been transformed into the new ITBE and it's been extremely successful. The dolls have been limited to 300 each and purchase is by lottery win only. Retail price is $75. plus postage which comes to a little over $81. for me. The sculpts have included such classics as Isha (as a ghost)

and now, the original Vanessa as a black woman.

None of the other sculpts, except Monogram, Lillith & Anja which were never changed, is the original sculpt. That's too bad because Adele's original and second sculpt were quite beautiful. Kyori's sculpt was perfect as it was and so was Natalia's.

Anyway, back to black. If I were going to change anything, I'd do her lips a different color. I think her hair is beautiful. The basic black dress with the red belt and red shoes are just fine.
For now she is going to stay in her box until I decide where she belongs.

Wilde Imagination's Virtual Factory Sale

As I predicted in a recent post, Wilde's web server crashed. At about 40 minutes in, everything was reporting as sold out and if one clicked on the check out links, a message was delivered saying the site is temporarily under maintenance.

Our Web site is temporarily unavailable while we perform routine system maintenance. We are working on the site to improve its appearance and functionality. We sincerely apologize for the inconvenience. Please visit us again later.

This is now on the front page of the website:

How disappointing for the people at Wilde. They must be incredibly frustrated with this happening during their debut virtual factory sale. I feel sympathy for them.

However, the site is functioning and one can look over all the items. The sale items have a VFS after them.

I did get lucky to get the Great Depression Ellowyne dressed doll at $69. and a pair of pink Ello shoes (Back Bow Pumps) that I have loved since I first saw them. (The shoes had already been on sale as End of Edition.)

After I scored these items, I went back and tried for an Evangeline and other items but that's when the server began to act up.

_______________________________

This is just a tiny, tiny fraction of an annoyance compared to what would happen to us computer users if major internet interruptions were to happen - possibly caused by hackers. I remember the time Bank of America closed their site due to hackers.  It's not enough to back up your own files these days. We'd better hope that our banks back up all their information in STONE.

The next war be on the virtual battlefield. It's already begun and it's frightening. I don't know anyone who lives off the grid. How many of us use on-line banking to pay bills? I venture to say that 98% of doll collectors buy and pay for their stuff on-line as opposed to using paper checks and/or money orders.

During the last few doctor visits I had, the doctors took notes on their laptops.

Sorry for going way off the bend there. It's one of my deepest beliefs that no information is private any longer. That HIPA thing we sign in the US is bullshit.

One bit of advice and then I shall shut up...check your credit card statement, bank statement and credit report often. Don't write anything in an email, on a doll board or on Facebook that you wouldn't publish in a newspaper.

Don't worry; be happy. Play with dolls.