So, this is anew thing I’m trying out where I post a few interesting things I’ve stumbled across the web over the last few weeks. I might never do this again, but… I thought it might be fun to try it out. Let me know if you guys like it…
Newly discovered the Arizona Costume Institute and their wonderful gallery of costume images. Check out this Dior suit.
Canada Elle magazine published two great articles on fashion appropriation- Native American & Asian– which I just discovered because I live under a rock, or something…
So, a reader named Elizabeth made the following comment:
I just wanted to let you know that lots of your paper dolls (like this one) don’t work when you cut them out because of their hair. It’s too long so when you try and put the tabs over the shoulders the hair is blocking the way. I’ve found a way to fix it but it would be nice if you could improve that! I’m not trying to be rude so if it is then sorry!
First of all, your comment is not rude at all Elizabeth. I’m more then happy to respond to this and I’m happy to take constructive criticism.
I have a lot of paper dolls with very long hair and it’s true that I have never indicated where I expect people will need to cut in order to make the clothing wearable. I always thought it would be obvious that you had to cut along the shoulders and the sides of the paper dolls body to allow for the tabs to fit, but perhaps this is not as obvious as I always thought it was.
So, I have done some rather quick and dirty diagrams here of where you may need to cut in order to allow long haired paper dolls to wear the clothing.
Hope this helps. As I say fairly regularly, questions are always appreciated and I try to answer all the questions that I can.
I looked at the calendar and I thought… I have two weeks before I present a conference and then go to two other conferences, I have time.. I can get ready for July. It’ll be easy.
And it turned out I was really really really wrong.
So… no real post today, but instead I offer a list of the things I learned while traveling:
1. It is possible to use the word “visioning” in the sentence and not be sarcastic, though probably not by me.
2. It is possible to get lost within 5 blocks of my destination more than once.
3. Some of the buildings in Chicago are quite beautiful, though most are just really tall.
4. Being called Miss. Rachel is not JUST a Southern Thing…
5. That lake in Chicago is really big… Also, on a clear day, you can see Michigan. Hi, Michigan…
6. Academic papers on the history of the escalator are surprisingly engaging.
7. The Chicago City Museum’s Ebony Fashion Fair exhibit is really cool and is up until January and everyone should go see it if they can. It rocked.
8. There was this dude named Beverly Nichols who wrote this great book I want to read called Crazy Pavements and then faded into obscurity.
9. Librarians are nice people and sometimes being one means that publishers give you free stuff.
Normal paper doll service will resume later this week. 🙂
So, I was quite sick for the last few days and so didn’t get a Monday post up. Rather, I spent my Memorial day in bed, sleeping and eating soup. I hope other people had a better day off. Since I didn’t want anyone to think I’d dropped off the face of the Earth or was eaten by a wild goat, I have decided to post something I wrote last week and never got around to posting. I hope no one minds.
Now, I’m pretty bad at math, but I do have a formula I use for calculating outfit options. (By the way, I also use this when packing for trips where it works pretty darn well too. 🙂 )
Here’s how I calculate the number of “outfits” possible from a set of paper doll mix and match clothing pieces. First, we must define our variables. I know a certain former math teacher who would be quite irate with me if I failed to define my variables.
X=Number of Tops
Y=Number of Bottoms
Z= Number of Jackets
W=Number of Shoes
V = Number of Dresses
N= Number of Outfit Combinations
So… the formula looks like this:
((X*Y)+V)*(W+1)*(Z+1)= N
Why the formula works…
An “outfit” consists of one top plus one bottom. Since every top can be worn with every bottom, the tops multiplied by the bottom gives us the number of outfit options. Dresses are generally not worn with tops or bottoms and therefore they are added after the multiplication has taken place. The shoes (W) and the jackets (Z) both have to have one added to them, because it is possible to function without wearing shoes or jackets and the one provides for that option. If the assumption is being made that shoes will always be worn than the 1 can be omitted from the (W+1) calculation.
The formula doesn’t always work. Some sets, such as Mia at the Bathing Place or Blossom are done with the assumption that certain pieces will always be worn together or aren’t really mix and match to begin with. Further, not all paper doll sets are mix and match oriented. I generally do not take necklaces, scarves and other accessory items into consideration, because I think they don’t dramatically change the outfit enough to warrant being counted as separate outfits. For example, had I considered them, Spikes and Pleats would have included 5920 combinations, which seems a bit much, even to me.
However, if you want to include the accessory items… than take N and do the following:
N= Number of Outfit Combinations
A= Number of Necklaces
B= Number of Bracelets
C= Number of Scarves
D= Number of Outfit Combinations including Accessories
So… now the formula gets to look like this:
N*(A+C+1)*B=D
And with that little foray into math, I am now going to go take more cold medication. Enjoy the calculations… And ask if you have questions.
Man, looking for paper dolls in foreign languages is a total blast, plus I keep finding new and neat things. So another reader, let me know that lalki papierowe is the Polish term for paper dolls. Here’s a few of the paper dolls I found…
On the other hand, if you want your child to grow up to be a cleaning lady… here’s the paper doll for you. I can’t decide how I feel about this paper doll. She’s interesting, but I think about how hard the cleaning women who do the library work and I feel its a little disrespectful…
Of course, I haven’t read the entire Polish blog post, so there’s that.
One of my readers, Erin, reminded me that klippdocka is the word for paper doll in Swedish (since I did that post on Påklædningsdukker) and so that sent me scurrying off to image searches (I actually like Bing more than Google for this sort of thing) and I found a lot and got reminded about a blog I’d rather forgotten about, despite having it on my links page.
Anna’s Blog hasn’t been active in a few years, but since the archives are available, its worth checking out. Her paper dolls are beautifully rendered in pencils and markers, always full color and vibrant. Her main paper doll has incredible historical costumes (this is my favorite) and she has other beautiful paper doll sets as well. I can’t say enough nice things about her work, and I wish she was still blogging with us.
I have noticed a lot of vintage styling in these Swedish paper dolls. I think people associate paper dolls with the past more than the present, which is a pity I suppose. Online dress up games are very popular these days, but for me, as a child, the best thing about a paper doll was getting to draw my own costumes for them. I wonder if that are of the equation is missing, both with magnetic paper dolls and with the online kind.
Who knew looking for klippdocka would make my nostalgic? As always, enjoy the paper dolls.
I recently received a very kind email from a reader letting me know that påklædningsdukker is Danish for paper doll. This, of course, caused a flurry of Google searching to track down paper dolls I might have missed around the web since many non-English sites never get indexed if you don’t know the right language keywords. (I’d insert a rant here about imperialism, the roman alphabet, the English language, and the internet, but really… I don’t think anyone cares…)
While I was searching Karen’s Blog came up often. I’ve linked to her blog on my Links page for a while, but for those of you who haven’t visited, I recommend her site very highly. Karen’s paper dolls are beautifully drawn in black and white or color and her stuffed animals and horses are some of my favorites.
Princess Razibor and her son I am also thinking from the fifties. The mild nudity (and I do mean mild) is interesting for me when I think about how nervous we are in the United States about any nudity at all.
A collection of mother and baby (or Nanny and baby) paper dolls, the different styles through time are quite illustrative of artistic movements. There’s more of the collection if you click on the left side bar links.
A cute paper doll named Liv (I think?), I couldn’t find the source site.
I hope everyone enjoys the paper dolls in Danish. I certainly had fun tracking them down and learning a word in a new language.
I confess that I haven’t read the book (its not out yet), but I’m flattered and excited to see my work used in such a fun and creative fashion. It’s hard to say no to a book about love and lucha libre.
Plus the video is really cute. Bonus points to anyone who can name the different sets used.
P.S. I am embarrassed that I had to look up both “freegan” and “yarn bombing”, clearly I am out of the loop on such things.
I tend to gather up links to paper dolls, so that once in a while I can post them like this. It’s both to show off the art of people I’ve never heard of before, but it’s also to embrace the intense diversity of these paper novelties. Some of these are printable and some are just photos, but all in all, I think it’s a fun listing.
When I was a kid, I was totally into realistic paper dolls (Tom Tierney and Peck-Garde), but now that I am older, if not wiser, I find myself drawn to the more stylized and unusual. Larry Bassin and Kwei-Lin Lum are two of my favorite modern artists.
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