Kids Toys

Doll Maker

Making the Doll, Doll Clothes

Clothes are an exciting problem for a doll maker. If you are a good doll maker, you can have great fun making a large wardrobe with several changes of clothes. Some peoplehave made delightful underwear in linen, and the outer garments were knitted. Some made their dolls into Alice in Wonderland, with neat little boots, a blue dress and a pretty apron, and some into Victorian ladies. Again the choice is left entirely to the worker and her capabilities. The principle in designing clothes is to base the dress pattern on the body pattern of the doll.

Doll makers, making underwear, such as pants and vests, take the body pattern, lay it on a piece of thin card and copy the body from the shoulders down to the knees. You must take into consideration that the doll you are going to dress, is now stuffed and therefore more rounded and not as flat as the pattern. Because of this, the doll maker should make the vest 1-3 cm wider on each side of the body, and flare it comfortably over the hips. Cut the neckline to approximately half way between the shoulder and the bottom of the armpit.

For the doll maker, pants are easy to make. Draw a straight line at the waist 2 cm wider on each side than the waist on the pattern. Draw another straight line 1-3 cm above the knees. Mark two points on the bottom line 3-25 cm beyond the side of the legs and join the bottom marks to the ends of the waist line. The doll maker should copy the gap between the legs, making it wider by 0-25 cm on each side. Cut out two pieces of material, sew them on. the sides and in the crutch. Finish off at the bottom of each leg with lace or ric rac. At the top, either sew a long row of tape and leave a small slit in the side of the pants, so that the tape can be tied into a bow. Or, machining on the inside of the pants, a row of bias binding, thread thin elastic and then the pants can be pulled on and off.

The dress is also based on the body pattern. For a doll maker to make a summer dress, is extremely easy to make and took a very short time. Take a piece of striped cotton 61-25 cm long and 16-5 cm wide. First of all machine a hem on one long side ot this strip of fabric, finishing it off on the right side with a row of nc rac. Fold the strip in half vertically, and mark and cut two slits 15-25 cm from the centre. Each slit is 8-25 cm deep. Finish it off with bias binding in contrasting colour, picking the colour of the stripe in the fabric.

Measure the neckline, which is 21-5 cm and gather the raw edge of fabric into the neckline, finishing it off with 2-5 cm bias binding folded in half, and in the same colour as the binding used for the arm slits. Sew up the back seam and either finish it with a button at the top or a bow made of bias binding used tor the neck; in which case one would use a longer strip, allowing for tying the bow.