Here is my custom Neighthan Rot wearing a custom made outfiut and a repaint by me.
I really am happy to having finished him, especially since he was one of the dolls I wasn't sure I'd be able to finish since I had so many customs on my plate at the same time.
I am really proud of how he turned out and I was so excited to show him off at Wonderland of Play.
Today I'll be walking you through how I repaired this Ever After High Lizzie Hearts doll's broken arm. While I wouldn't call this a fool-proof method, and I'm not sure that this repair would hold up to being played with, if you've got a beloved doll you want to repair, this should be just fine for a doll that's mostly going to be displayed.
The best part is, this will retain the articulation of the arm and/or knee (this method will technically also work for knee joints, though knees are harder than arms to work with). So let's jump in.
Tools required: Craft Knife, Jewelry pliers, Wire (gauge depends on size of joint), Super Glue, Hot Glue, Patience.
Let's start with our patient.
I thrifted this Lizzie doll a few days ago, along with a Venus McFlytrap, as shown in the above image. As soon as I saw the taped up arm, I knew the joint was broken, but hey, she was like 80c USD. I can apply some elbow grease for that cheap. Plus it gives me an excuse to finally make this tutorial.
They went a little overkill with that much tape, but whatever works?
I cut the tape off carefully with a craft knife. I didn't take a pic of that, but I think you can image what a broken doll arm looks like. Unless you have aphantasia I guess, but that's getting off topic.
First thing I did was use the craft knife to slice along the seam lines, then pried the upper arm open (slowly. seriously go slow.) with a pair of jewelry pliers. It will leave marks on the plastic, but I can buff those out later.
Why am I doing this if the arm's already broken? I want to remove what's left of the peg that's in there. You could also drill it out if you have a dremel, but I wanted to avoid this tutorial needing power tools.
So here's the arm, pried open, with the peg removed.
To close it back up, I used a tiny bit of acetone to melt the plastic at the seams, then held it together until it hardened enough to stay in place. Leave it for a few hours to make sure it's all fully cured, then you can sand the area smooth.
And here's the arm with the broken peg.
So what now? We need to remove the peg piece that's attached to the elbow. I couldn't get a photo of that since it's a delicate process and I only have 2 hands, but here's an artist rendering that would give you the idea.
Take a craft knife, and SLOWLY. CAREFULLY. cut into the ring that surrounds the elbow joint. YOU DO NOT WANT TO GO TOO DEEP, TOO QUICKLY. YOU DO NOT WANT TO ACCIDENTALLY CUT THROUGH THE ELBOW POST. Just go nice and slow. Just chip a little out at a time until you get to the center.
Use pliers as well to pull out the rest of the bits, though you might have to cut a good bit out before you can pull the rest out.
As for my doll, the operation went successfully.
This is what the elbow looks like with the joint peg removed.
Now we've gotten past the hard part, we'll cut off a few inches of wire and string that though the elbow joint. Once through, we'll twist it until it's reasonably tight to the joint. If that makes sense.
It should look like this. Give it a test fit and cut the wire shorter as needed so there's no gap in the joint.
My test fit. Yep, I recycled this for the top photo as well. The blue is just painter's tape.
If you find you can't get it tight enough, and it feels too loose, I'd add a drop a super glue in there. Just keep moving the joint as the glue dries, and it'll add some friction so your arm will hold a pose.
Speaking of glue, I also add a dab of hot glue to the top of our new peg. The coating will add thickness that will help it stay in the upper arm. Tape works too, but hot glue holds up better.
Here's our newly repaired arm back on the doll. Aside from a slight glimmer of silver, the repair is not very obvious I think.
Lizzie can now enjoy having two functional arms again. Whoo-hoo.
While not 100% a beginner repair, it's not particularly difficult either. Just takes some patience and a reasonably steady hand.
Before I go though, some disclaimers/notes: Some wires can rust overtime, so keep an eye on your doll to make sure the wire isn't degrading and discoloring them.
Also, if you do a repair like this, then sell the doll, do let the buyer know. I feel like I shouldn't have to say that, but don't be one of those sellers okay?
This same method can be used for knees, but thighs tend to be made of a harder plastic, and it can be more difficult to pry them open to take the old, broken peg out with out major damage to the upper leg.
I went slightly overboard with this second historical doll project. Here's my first one. The style is from around 1897 and more of a middle class style. As with my first doll outfit, I tried to stick to historical methods as much as possible, but the scale forced me to do some deviations. I hand-sew everything though sewing machine was already widely used, because in this scale it's easier to control the stitch, there's not that much to sew anyway and also I just really like hand-sewing. Here's all the items I made. As said, I went a little overboard. One thing that's missing is the corset cover, but the layers of fabric were creating enough bulk on the waist as is so I decided to not make one.
This time I decided to try repainting the face. I don't have any doll customization materials, so I used acrylics. After couple of attempts I got decent results. Acrylics can't make as smooth and delicate finish as pastels, pencils and gouache, which can be used on vinyl with basing sprays, and I'm not experienced with painting small details on 3D objects, so it's a bit smudged at points, especially with the other eye. I aimed for 1890s very neutral make up and the type of expression that was popular in fashion plates and other illustrations.
Undergarments
Combinations and stockings
The combinations are split crotch as they were in the period. They are from thin cotton voile I have a lot of and is very appropriate. I didn't have really tiny enough lace for this, so it's kinda bulky, but I think it's okay enough. The stockings are cotton knit, which fits well. The garters are not actually necessary for this doll since her legs are rubbery.
Corset
I made the corset from a firm-ish linen and satin rayon pretending to be silk as the fashion fabric. The stitching of the boning channels is not super neat, this fabric is very unforgiving, I didn't have exactly matching thread and the scale made it very difficult. I of course didn't have tiny busk, so I used small hooks, sewed thread loops for them and used narrow metal wire for the edges. I think it looks surprisingly right on the outside. I used the same wire as the boning to reinforce the lacing on the back. I didn't actually use boning elsewhere but the tightly packed linen edges in the boning channels kinda work like lighter boning. I think it keeps the shape pretty ways even with just that. I stitched cotton tape inside to shape the corset further. I also didn't have tiny metal eyelets so I hand-sewed the lacing holes.
Bustle pad
The bustle pad is from linen and stuffed with tiny cabbage.
Petticoat
The petticoat is from the same cotton as the combinations.
Outer wear
Skirt
The fabric is cotton half-panama. It's pretty thin, but firm. I would have liked to use a woven wool, but I didn't have any that's thin enough to work in this scale. I think this cotton looks close enough in this scale to a wool with a tight weave, so I'm imagining it's that. My problem was that the cotton was white, but I wanted light brown. I wasn't going to buy any fabric for this, so I did the reasonable thing and dyed it with red onion peals (I've been doing natural dye experiments so this worked well for me).
Shirtwaist
The shirtwaist is from the same cotton as the undergarments. Yes, I dyed it too. I didn't have thin enough cotton in a color that would fit with the skirt and the purple bow, so I dyed it light blue with fabric color. Since I already went the trouble of dyeing I decided I might as well make a small flower print to it since that was popular in the era. I didn't want it to jump out too much but the lighting makes it even less visible. I made it with a white fabric pen. The collar and cuffs are reinforced with linen. I also sewed small stick-like beads to the cuffs on both sides, so one acts as a button (I sewed a buttonhole too) and the other makes it look like they are cufflinks. The bow is from the same fabric as the corset and the belt is sewn from the same cotton as the shirtwaist. The buckle is from a barbie belt.
Waistcoat
The waistcoat is from the same fabric as the skirt, thought the lapels and the back are from another satin rayon. I tailored the front panels and the lapels by stitching the linen interlining with tailor's stitches (I don't remember if that's the correct word in English) into shape. There is some wonkiness on one side of the hemline for some reason.
Boots
I made the slightly insane decision to make the shoes fully from leather, like they would have been in the period. I had an old broken leather wallet I had saved in case I needed some leather scarps. It has fairly thin leather, so it was workable here. It's light brown though, so I used black shoe polish to darken it. I wanted black or very dark brown shoes. I stacked the heels from glue and leather pieces and carved them into the right shape and sewed the shoe itself to leather shaped as the sole and glued it to the heeled and shaped sole. After I had shaped the shoes and the heels as much as I could I painted the heels black.
Over the past few months I’ve been OBSESSED with BJD and doll customizations and I finally did one last night!!
This is my Penny’s Box custom of Red Fox, the Last picture above was the before, and I am absolutely in love with her ahhh she is SERVING!! I’m really proud of it ahh 🥺🦊🍂
Some progress pics below! I also unstrung her to do some body blushing, I also edited her outfit to suit her new colour palette a little more! (Her original socks were also bright orange but I found these brown ones on kikagoods and liked them way more!!)
She's been freed of her nail polish lingerie, very carefully!
And, per her remaining permanent marker spot, gold paint has been added, and her eyes and lips are glossed for shine.
Now, she also had only the one sad boot, and I don't have any Bratz shoes at all-- so I've gone ahead and made her some shoes out of polyclay. Happily they fit her and she can stand tall again!
OP these shoes are amazing! Is the polyclay oven bake stuff, or air dry? I’m looking at making custom shoes for my own dolls and no one seems to have a tutorial or suggestions anywhere on how to go about it!
It's polyclay for oven, yeah! Sorry for a late reply.
I used Kato brand, which is a little hard and I find takes more effort to condition by hand so a good trick for it is to gently warm it with a hot water bottle or a ten seconds zap in a microwave. Makes it easier to work with.
A little bit of liquid sculpey is also good for joining small parts and details without running the risk of mashing them in; I didn't need to use any for these, but I would definitely suggest having some. Easy fix for post bake breakage too.
I made and baked the soles and leg clips first, so they were solid to work on, and then sculpted the rest around them.
The shoe tips I cut out a semicircle and smoothed over the top of the foil. Then a second bake.
You can bake poly clay a couple of times, so don't be afraid to set parts firm as you go and work in sections. For smaller pieces, covering them over with foil can help prevent any burning or discolouration issues.
Hmm so turns out I have a lot of feelings about intellectual property and corporate ownership.
The live action reviews are messy because they’ve made assumptions about what is canon. I’ve been through reboots before so I’m used to Eras of Canon (like the Star Wars extended universe or Trek timelines)…
Garrett Sander is the creator of Monster High but he didn’t get to decide what was canon at the time due to corporate and now he’s not employed by Mattel and has no say over the characters in G3.
Put simply, Clawdeen isn’t a lesbian in G1 canon because corporate never allowed it and G3 canon will be whatever Mattel decides even if it goes against a character design basic by Sanders because he didn’t truly own any intellectual property created during company employment and has now been shut out of it (probably with no royalties whatsoever).
I’ve long felt this type of IP ownership is disgusting. Carter Bryant was struggling to pay hospital bills while his creation: Bratz, not revamped, the literal original designs, are selling like hotcakes because he doesn’t technically own his work.
And while the monster high tag fights over whether Cleo/Deuce or meangirl!Torelei is “canon”, I’m just getting more and more annoyed that “canon” was never Sander’s to decide and isn’t going to pay his bills. He’s not even being sent the repros of his original designs. Mattel can do whatever they want with the Monster High characters and worse they can milk it without the creator getting a dime.
So that’s my contribution to the discourse: Please look beyond the characters at how the sausage is made.
If fans decide to campaign for anything from Mattel, please can it be to allow their artists royalties on their work.
"Oh, we walked together, and talked together, and just before we say goodbye, he takes me in his arms, and then... I wake up."
Because there's no Princess Aurora, without Briar Rose! 🌹
She was another kind of challenge, but a challenge nonetheless 👀 This time I wanted to stray from the usual sweet expression, and went more with a "bratty" one 😁
Problem is, when trying to achieve it, it's so easy to actually step into "evil smile" territory 🤣
This repaint was actually my second attempt, after the first one I decided to take a day or two to really study her mold, and finally get what wasn't working...In the end, I went the hard way, and partially resculpted her face, while afraid to ruin a LE head, I knew I wouldn't have been satisfied otherwise, go big or go home basically 😅
For the dress, I've mostly kept the original concept in mind, with the same colors I remember from the VHS (the palette of the outfit on the restored version is too gray for my taste, give me the cream, the turtle dove, the beige, the maroon!!), saving the tiny spinning wheel embroidery on the corset...it seems like this doll has been one big experiment from start to finish 👀
In the end, I love how she turned out, and most of all I'm glad I didn't give up on the expression, I really hate to take the easy way, I know it would have frustrated me too much to leave untouched 😵💫
Better make that kind of decision at the start of the process than at the end 🫠
I messaged her on DOA when I just joined. She uses Our Generation horses in her photoshoots, and I was crazy curious about them (and how she painted them).
She gave me a full breakdown of where she gets them, how she paints them, and told me all sorts of interesting stuff about her life. MB is a real OG.
i get ppl dont want frankie to be androgynous bc yes u can be femme and nonbinary, but yall getting mad at ppl who draw frankie in pants or give their dolls short hair are insane. putting them in a flannel ≠ masc suddenly
To make the titular extra mouth of the Futakuchi-Onna, I cut out the back of the doll's head and formed a platform out of milliput to act as the tongue, using the rest to form the lips. The teeth were made separately out of translucent Fimo clay to give them a tooth-like translucence. The wires were added in before the mouth to eventually be the bases of strands of prehensile hair that will be holding food.
Though a bit ad hoc, the mouth turned out really well and looked even better when painted fully.
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