In honor of the holidays, we have this appropriately dated November 24th, 1895 art supplement to the Boston Sunday Globe, which printed a lot of fun cut-outs and paper dolls at the turn of the century and into the next. This one is interesting as it shows a traditional family: mother, father, son, and daughter, all sitting down to their holiday meal.

These interesting assemblies are a strange lot. Definitely a lost plaything of the past. Click on the image to see the work in more detail!

I meant to post a nice fashion plate yesterday for Fashion Plate Friday (was hoping to get that going again), but yesterday turned out to be rather busy, so I blew it. But I won't let the weekend go without posting something (because, surprise surprise, I am still working on the dolls and don't know when I will finish ~ and don't want to make any more promises that I can't keep!  But anyway, I still missed Fashion Plate Friday, so I present you, instead, an antique paper doll from a series recently selling on eBay (a.k.a. the devil). The seller of these dolls has been posting them one at a time and each has been selling for upwards of $150-$200. I can see why for the real collector: they are absolutely gorgeous. Pysche was a popular French ladies' magazine and produced quite a few paper dolls during the 1830s and 1840s. If you look at posts under the category Antique, you may find others.

One of the characteristics of many Victorian paper dolls is that they were double-sided. Or rather, they were built to be viewed from the front and the back. This required a level of artistry on the illustrators and it also required careful assembly on the part of those who cut them out and played with them. The double-sided image was important to girls and dressmakers throughout the century: fashions were made to be as equally pleasing from the back as they were from the front. This was especially true of the bustle era. For this doll, the hat is a separate two-sided article as well. Click on the image below to see a little bit better detail.

Although there are a number of these dolls that have been posted for sale, I chose this one because it's a very cold morning (about 20 degrees), and the winter ermine looks nice and cozy. Also, the date of the doll and the current date were nicely close.

No matter what I draw, I find the influence of Tom Tierney in all of my paper doll work ~ probably because I learned a lot about how to think about paper dolls from cutting out his characters and spent a good deal of time studying anatomy from his paper doll postures.

And while Tom Tierney is a past master in the paper doll world, I am kind of disappointed that my own style is not very original. I'm in good company, of course: I see Tierney's influence in a lot of original paper dolls on the internet.

Perhaps what ultimately distinguishes one artist from another will be in the design of the clothes, the expressions and stories of the characters, and the handling of whatever medium in which the artwork is created. I have made no decisions about these two on the right. The last two dolls I created (two weeks ago), I completely ruined by attempting a new medium. I haven't decided whether to play it safe with these, but I want to get them out of the pencil stage before the day is over and hopefully posted properly by the end of the weekend.  Don't mind the hot cocoa stains on the art, there. The dog wanted to share out of my cup. Silly thing.

Looking back through this blog to its beginnings, I realize I have gone through a lot of drafts and a lot of reboots on these dolls, looking for the right set (what a lot of work!). Sadly, I was never happy with any of the sets I posted (even though it seems to me that some of them were actually kind of cool). But something seemed missing, I guess, so I just continued to make dolls. I am definitely done with that rut. No more remakes, reboots, or starting over. I feel like I've learned a lot from creating those other dolls (over and over) and now's the time to settle down and get to work. Time's a'wasting, after all!

Today is our first snow day of the season, so naturally I have all this crazy energy (yay snow!). Let's hope it leads to good things.

Also, it's Edwin Booth's birthday, so please visit the paper doll I made of him a while back and wish him well (though he's been dead for over 100 years).

What's this? Another post so soon? Could it be a sign of the apocalypse? No, it's just Veteran's Day and I couldn't let it pass without posting something patriotic.

This is a paper doll set from about the turn of the century by Raphael Tuck featuring a patriotic theme (including an Uncle Sam outfit!). The others are uniforms for cavalry, infantry, and the navy. These uniforms are all in the style of what was pretty common by the end of the 19th century (American soldiers still wore blue), and the navy uniform in particular hadn't changed since the early part of the century.

Although the doll is a bit stiff (being at attention), this is a nice set and was auctioned off last year some time at Morphy's. I had downloaded so many interesting vintage paper dolls from that auction and have scarcely begun to post them!  Anyway, the resolution on these isn't the greatest, but they are nevertheless nice to look at.

I have very few of these sticker-type paper dolls. I generally don't find them very interesting subject-wise, and don't really like the idea of stickers for clothing since you can't really gather the wardrobe in a pile and luxuriate at all the colors and shapes ~ which I think is one of the great appeals of playing with paper dolls.

Nevertheless, occasionally a sticker doll comes along that I absolutely must have for my collection, and it seems like artist A.G. Smith is the one to make them.

This little Abraham Lincoln is fabulously simple and nicely researched. As an added bonus, Smith has included a pair of hands wielding an axe. Of course, this is intended to represent Lincoln as the "rail-splitter" of his youth, but I think it doubles nicely in case you want to play Abraham Lincoln, Vampire-Hunter as well. In case you have never seen the above book, be sure to look at the image of the back cover, though if you're sensitive to bloodshed, you might want to skip it.

Because this is a Dover "Little" activity book, it's nicely inexpensive and fun for all ages (vampires or no). This is one of several Lincoln paper dolls I have to share with you and it being ten days until the anniversary of the Gettysburg address, it seems now's a good time to do so. It strikes me peculiar, however, that such an unlikely subject would have so many paper dolls modeled after him. Not that I am complaining.

This weekend I did some browsing on eBay (so naughty, I know), but I am being good for the most part and not spending willy-nilly. Meanwhile, I am enjoying discovering a lot of interesting dolls out there ~ from the beautiful antique kind to the flimsy magazine variety. And one of the things I have noticed is that however beautiful the clothing may be, the dolls themselves are sometimes anything but.

Case in point the sad little horror that I post today. Unfortunately I haven't any real information about the doll except that it was printed in 1985.

It would seem to be (judging by the undergarments) intended to come from the 19th century (vaguely?), although it could really be anywhere from 1830 to 1900. The "painted" hairstyle doesn't provide us with any further clues.

Perhaps there was originally another page that went with this; one on which the doll's name, the artist, and other information was provided, but alas that all seems lost. There are some initials attached to the foot of the doll, but they don't mean anything to me.

One would hope, as well, that if there was another page with other clothes on it, they included a chemise of some sort. It seems somehow indecent for this poor naked doll to have to go through life with only a pair of pantalettes and a ruffley gown to wear.

There are a lot of paper dolls in the style of actual dolls out there. I've never been fond of them as a general rule and this one is a good example of how they can be off-putting and even somewhat creepy. Click on the picture to see the detail of this poor creature's hideous dog-like face.

While wandering around the internet, I stumbled across the following Japanese fashion prints (circa 1888), depicting the empress of Japan in western clothing. The artist is Yoshitoshi, who is considered the last great master of the ukiyo-e tradition. These prints were made at the height of Japan's new "westernization".

The emperor and empress encouraged the adoption of western clothing and customs as part of modernizing Japan and breaking from centuries-old feudal customs.

It was a tough period for Japan and you can read a little more about what it meant to Japanese women at the source where I found these images: Lina's Lookbook.

Perhaps needless to say, the prints are absolutely beautiful (the colors are amazing!). When compared to cheap American prints of the same era, the difference is astounding. But then again, "cheap" American kind of sums up the reason there.

I was looking at images of 19th century Japan mostly out of curiosity; I am watching Shogun (which takes place in the 1600s), but so much of the Japanese style did not change until the 19th century, so I was interested in how constant the clothing had been over the centuries in many ways. When you look at how diverse western clothing is from century to century, this constancy is particularly striking.

And yes, I am sort of playing with the idea of making a paper doll based on the character of John Blackthorn in Shogun, but it's kind of out the era I'd prefer working in, so it was just an idle thought and a few sketches on an energy bill that happened to be handy for scrawling. Nevertheless, I do have two Japanese characters who I could draw belonging to the "proper" era represented in this blog. Eventually. Meanwhile, click on the pictures above to see them in

Meanwhile, I created two dolls over the weekend, but made some really poor judgment choices in inking and painting them, so, sadly, out they go. I will try to make new ones this coming weekend and hopefully have something to share by Sunday.