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Happy March! Here’s Akiko in her Sweet Lolita JSK

A Sweet Lolita paper doll with a ruffled dress, purse and two pairs of shoes in color or black and white for coloring. Free from paperthinpersonas.com.

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Today, I am pleased to share version 2 of Akiko whose rocking a Sweet Lolita dress and ringlet curls. For those of you not aware of the Japanese alternative street style known as Lolita, here’s a brief run down- It’s a alternative fashion style from Japan- think Gothic fashion or Punk fashion in the United States and the UK. According to Lolita the influences are Victorian children’s clothing. As someone whose seen a lot of Victorian children’s clothing, I don’t quite agree, but you can decide for yourself if you want by looking through my Lolita Fashion pinterest board.

One thing I adore about Lolita is that it is not just about the dresses. Rather, the idea is to put together a “coordinate” which is a perfectly coordinating outfit from the tights to the dress to the bonnet. This is not surprising given that this style came from the country that developed a system of colors and motifs for kimonos based on the seasons when they were to be worn. Talk about matchy-matchy.

Anyway, within Lolita, as within almost every alternative fashion scene on the planet, there’s an endless collection of sub-genres and variants. The three major genres are Sweet Lolita, Gothic Lolita and Classic Lolita. I love this post from F Yeah Lolita with example wardrobes in each genre.

For my first Dames and Dandies foray into Lolita (and not my last, never fear) I went with Sweet Lolita, though there is a Gothic Lolita variant on my Patreon page that I hope you will download and play with as well. I tried to capture the bell shaped skirt and I designed what is known as a JSK (Jumperskirt) which is a sleeveless dress designed to go over a blouse. I made 2 matching pairs of shoes and one purse.

So, I did my usually research hunt for reference photos when I started my latest Lolita fashion paper doll. My previous favorite fashion blog devoted to Lolita, F Yeah Lolita has not updated in a long time. So, I dusted off my librarian searching skills and found a few new ones that I really liked. Magical Girl Me, Lolita Fashion on Tumblr and Miss Carol Belle’s Lolita Fashion Sewing and Pattern Advice all appear to be currently active, if you’re looking for more information on Lolita styles. I also had fun reading through Lolita Tips. Reading through that led me to the amazing Loli Library where I think I could easily get lost for hours staring at pretty dresses.

So, let me know if you like this Sweet version or the Gothic version better in a comment. I’d love to know! And if there’s a great Lolita fashion blog I don’t know about, I’d like to know that too!

Need a Doll to wear today’s outfit? All the A Pose Dolls & Clothing

Meet Akiko: A New “A Pose” Paper doll

A super cute Asian paper doll with three pairs of shoes in color or black and white. Free to print from paperthinpersonas.com.

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Today’s new A pose paper doll is Akiko.

Like all Japanese names, the meaning of Akiko changes depending on the kanji characters selected to combine to make the name. The “Aki” part of the name can come from kanji meaning “clear, crystal”, “bright” or “autumn” while the “ko” comes from the kanji meaning “child” according to Behind the Name. Someone with more knowledge of Japanese will have to update me if I misunderstand how this works. It’s also the name of one of the princesses of the Imperial House of Japan.

Akiko has three pairs of shoes and can wear, of course, any of the clothing for the A Pose paper dolls. I think my favorite of her shoes are her pink sandals.

I hope everyone is having a good week. I’m still in recovering from illness mode, so I’ll keep today’s post short. Enjoy the paper doll!

Need a clothing for today’s paper doll? All the A Pose Dolls & Clothing

Meet Alice: The First of the New Printable Paper Doll Series

A blond paper doll with three pairs of shoes. Free to print from paperthinpersonas.com.

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Happy New Year!

This is the first post of the new series, Dames and Dandies. I really should be calling it the only paper doll series, but we’ll stick with new paper doll series for now.

There will be three poses for these printable paper dolls. This is the A Pose. There will also be a B Pose. And a guy paper doll pose called the C pose. Right now, we’re starting with the A pose. Wednesday and Friday, I will be posting clothing for the A pose and then next Monday I’ll post the first doll in the B pose series.

C pose guy paper dolls will post the week after that. Nice and alphabetical, you know? Also right now, I have more guy content than either the A or the B pose ladies. Weird… that has never happened before in my paper dolling life.

This is Alice. She is the first of the A pose dolls and this is the first version of Alice. Other Alice versions will, I suspect, follow. In fact, I already have a few in process so… not only do I suspect it, I know it to be true.

While I would love to switch to a daily updating schedule, I just don’t think there’s really very sensible with my graduate school classes starting up again in a few days. So, right now, the blog will update Monday, Wednesday and Fridays.

And so, it begins… 🙂

Feel free to ask me any burning questions you may have or even just non-burning ones. The truth is that I might not have an answer yet, but I do want to hear everyone’s thoughts and concerns.

Need a clothing for today’s paper doll? All the A Pose Dolls & Clothing

Yumiko’s Super Cute Sundress to Print and Play With

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Today’s Printable Paper Doll Inspirations: Um… Sundresses,
I guess?
Yumiko, an Asian paper dolls, with a sundress and two pairs of shoes. Free to print and play with from paperthinpersonas.com.

A post-apocalyptic fashion printable paper doll with a dress, boots and tattoos. Free to print, color, and play with from paperthinpersonas.com.

You know, I haven’t posted a new Yumiko paper doll since last year when she was a fairy. So, I figured it was long past time that she got to get a new look.

To tell you the truth, I would love to have some long involved explanation as too why I chose to create this sundress. It’s just not that complicated. I knew I wanted to draw a sundress and this style has been floating around the fashion magazines lately.

By lately, I mean like seven months ago, because sometimes I’m a little slow on the turn around for my paper doll creations.

I also wanted to draw Yumiko with a different modern hair style. I settled on this choppy bob.

As you may remember, there’s usually a gentleman Sprite to go with the lady Sprites. Fear not!

Tomorrow (I know, not ever a Wednesday!), I’ll be posting a new  paper doll. He’s very dashing!

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Looking for something else for today’s Sprite paper doll to wear? Pick out some clothing here.

A New Isadora Mini-Maiden Paper Doll to Color

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Today’s Printable Paper Doll Inspirations: Fall Fashions

A paper doll to color and print out from paperthinpersonas.com with a dress, contemporary hair cut and two pairs of shoes. Part of the Mini-Maiden series.
It does feel like autumn might finally be coming to Alabama. The weather is starting to cool down and today was just beautiful. I spent part of the weekend at the local botanical gardens. They are free and a wonderful place to go walking. I really enjoyed them and I want to go back again.

Today’s Mini-Maiden paper doll is Isadora who I haven’t featured since March when she was a faun. Isadora is named for Isadora Duncan, the dancer. I can’t remember if I mentioned that recently, but someone asked me how I name my paper dolls a while back and I was like, “Well… kinda randomly, truth be told.”

Anyway, I’ve been going through the fashion magazines of the season. I am ready for boots and I am ready for tights. Isadora doesn’t have tights, but she does have some fun boots. I love autumn and winter. They are by far my favorite seasons in Alabama.

Her other shoes are more formal. I thought her dress could go either way depending on the shoes. I also try to draw extra shoes when I draw dolls. An old habit from my full color dolls with skin tones.

Isadora, being in black and white, is a paper doll you can color anyway you wish. That’s part of the flexibility of black and white paper dolls.

I confess though, I was never a big “colorer” as a kid, so I still prefer the ones in color.

I hope everyone is having a great Monday and let me know what you think if today’s Isadora in a comment.

And if you love the blog, think about becoming a Patron, following it on Facebook or telling a friend about it.

Need a more outfits for today’s Mini-Maiden Paper Doll? Find More Clothing Here. 

Meet Nikola: The New Ms Mannequin Printable Paper Doll

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Today’s Printable Paper Doll Inspirations: The Challenge of Olive Skintone 
A printable paper doll named Nikola with brown hair, blue eyes and olive skin. She has two pairs of shoes and can wear any of the Ms. Mannequin clothing.

A set of urban fashion inspired printable paper doll clothing from paperthinpersonas.com. One pair of jeans and two tank tops make up today's paper doll outfit.

I’ve written before about some of the challenges of paper doll skin-tones. It’s important to me that their be a variety of paper doll skin-tones. I also think it’s important that there not be too much variety, because if there is than it’s hard to share shoes among the dolls.

So, I wanted to do an olive skin-tone and that was how this paper doll’s skin-tone began. Once I had it created, I realized that it was really only one hex off from the skin-tone I created for Stella and Chloe.

At that point, I was like- Why not just use their skin-tone? There’s no difference once this prints, because printers just aren’t that precise. And I couldn’t even see a difference.

And so, Nikola can share her shoes with both Stella and Chloe and they can share shoes with her.

Nikola is a feminine form of Nicholas from countries including the Czech republic, Poland and Germany. I’m half Czech, so I thought it would be fun to give her a Czech name.

I gave Nikola blue eyes, because my sister has olive skin and blue eyes. It’s not a very common combination, but I’ve been told it’s more common in Eastern Europe than you see it in the US. I’ve never been (but I so badly want to go to Prague), but someday I will.

Tomorrow, there’s a curvy fantasy gown and then on Monday… I actually have no idea. I should sort that out. 🙂

Need some clothing for today’s Ms Mannequin paper doll? Pick Out Some Ms. Mannequin Clothing Here

Marisole Monday Goes Cyberpunk with some Amazing Boots

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Today’s Printable Paper Doll Inspirations: The white dress in this Sprite set and the dress on the right

An african american paper doll with blond hair and a cyberpunk inspired dress with thigh high boots. She's part of the Marisole Monday paper doll series and is one of hundreds of paper doll designs.

A fantasy princess paper doll ball gown to print, color, and play with. One of hundreds of paper dolls to print from paperthinpersonas.com.

There are styles I come back to over and over again. This dress is very much like the white dress in this set and this dress, both designs I did years ago.

This is by far the most complex thing I have ever tried to create with the “shiny” look. It’s not perfect and there are problems, but I am not unhappy with how it turned out. Finding latex or vinyl reference images for the full bell skirt was basically impossible.

Also, google image searching the phrase “vinyl full-skirt” sometimes causes interesting results that are probably not kid friendly.

As for her hair, I was thinking of retro 1960s styles. I really wanted something that felt a little retro sci-fi. I

As for the color, I can’t really explain, but somehow once that dress was drawn I just knew it was going to be bright orange.

It’s like someone went clubbing and said, “I know! I want to look like a piece of cartoon fruit.”

And before I forget, I want to wish everyone a Happy Labor Day! In the words of Mother Jones, “Pray for the dead and fight like hell for the living.”

Need a more outfits for today’s Marisole Monday & Friends Paper Doll? Find More Clothing Here. 

A new paper doll for the B&B Sorceress Gowns Project!

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Today’s Printable Paper Doll Inspirations: Sorceresses and Flowers

A fantasy paper doll with a gown from paperthinpersonas.com.

A paper doll adventuring outfit with a belted tunic over a shirt, leggings and boots. She also has a sword.

Back in April I asked my Patrons what I could do for an ongoing series and they voted on sorceress gowns. So, my goal with the with the Sorceress Gowns Project was to create a series of gowns for a sorceress. That’s probably obvious.

I also thought I should make a few dolls to wear the gowns. So, I designed this one to go with my last one from April. There are plenty of B&B dolls that fit with the theme from before April of this year. I think this doll, this doll, and this doll both have a sorceress feel to them.

I thought about doing another over the top hair style as I did with last doll to go with the gowns. But I decided that the simple long hair was a nice counter-balance to the complex gown.

I had a lot of fun coloring the gown in these muted spring time colors. There’s something very spring feeling to me to this gown. I think it’s the light colors combined with the floral motif that gets me feeling that way.

Of course, she needs gowns to be a sorceress. There are four gowns so far, one for each elements. You can see them all here under the Sorceress Gowns Project tag. I do try to organize these things somewhat. It’s my natural librarian tendencies.

As always, I hope you’ve enjoyed the paper dolls this week and I always love to hear what you think, so leave a comment if you like.

Need to get some more clothing for this Bodacious & Buxom paper doll to wear? Pick out some clothing here

Meet Janette, The New Mini-Maiden Paper Doll

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Today’s Printable Paper Doll Inspirations: Fashion Magazines and My Patrons
Janette, a black and white paper doll to print and color with a sundress and two pairs of shoes from paperthinpersonas.com.
A few months ago, I asked my Patrons to vote on a name for a new Mini-Maiden paper doll. A lot happened and I just didn’t get around to finishing her until recently, but I am super excited to present Janette. There will be a Janette paper doll every day this week to get her off to a solid start as an addition to the Mini-Maiden family.

Janette can, of course, wear any of the already created Mini-Maiden clothing and share shoes with Faye, Greta, Hazel and Isadora.

(As it happens, I name the Mini-Maiden‘s in alphabetical order, because… I dunno. It seemed like a good idea at the time?)

The first of the three Janette’s that will be posting this week is a contemporary Janette. I thought it was a nice place to start.

She has a sundress based on designs from my fashion magazine obsession, as are her sandals.

I wanted to give her a short contemporary looking hair cut, as this it the “contemporary” Janette.

On Wednesday, Janette will go to Space!

As always, a big thank you to my Patrons for helping me pick out her name.

Well, what do you think of Janette? Let me know in a comment. I always love to hear from you all.

Need a more outfits for today’s Mini-Maiden Paper Doll? Find More Clothing Here. 

A New Modern Asian Poppet Paper Doll

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Today’s Printable Paper Doll Inspirations:The Lack of Asian Poppet Paper Dolls
A free printable paper doll with a dress and shoes from paperthinpersonas.com.

A free printable paper doll with a dress and shoes from paperthinpersonas.com.

There are 14 Poppets dolls that I have created over the course of the Poppets 4 year existence and only one of them is Asian. That seemed rather sad to me, so I decided to create a second Asian poppet paper doll. Sometimes, it is by noticing what I haven’t done lately that makes me realize, “Oh, I should do a ________________ I haven’t done a _________ in a while.”

(Like the pajamas last week were totally that.)

It also felt a little odd to only have on Asian Poppet paper doll when you consider that they are all based on Ball Jointed Dolls from Asia, which also rarely look Asian, now that I mention it. I’ve always wondered why… but I digress.

Today’s paper doll has the same skin-tone as Posey from 2014, so they can share shoes. Poor Posey hasn’t had any sandals for the last 3 years. You have to feel a little for her, you know?

I went back and forth a bit about clothing options before I settled on a simple knit dress. The dress went through about six different color combinations, I confess. For what is a pretty simple paper doll, this doll gave me some trouble.

Love her? Hate her? Wish they made that dress in your size? Let me know in a comment.

Need a paper doll to wear today’s outfit? Pick a Poppet Paper Doll Here.