This sweet little girl came to me with earlier repairs. Not to disparage whoever did them, they made a common mistake - making a vintage doll look new. Also, the detail work was not particularly skillful. Nancy had other issues - cracks in the composition, a bad split at the back of the head, a missing eyelash, very poorly repaired toes, broken fingers, and on and on. You could certainly tell she had been loved! The original owner asked for her dolly to be restored to the shape and look she remembered. I started off by searching for photos of Arranbee Nancy's so I had an example to follow when restoring the poorly painted hair and face.
Nancy (not the patient) by ArranBee
This is what poor little Nancy looked like when she came to me.
Not too much is needed to say, I suppose. The photos speak loudly in themselves!
I find one fault of other doll repair artists whose work I end up re-doing is that they often use paint colors 'straight out of the bottle'. Older dolls have tones which are no longer available, as well as a patina that has aged and altered them. You have to mix. It is impossible to use modern paints to achieve a vintage look. Note the poorly-painted and placed eyebrows; the wrong color of hair. The too red lips, and the many, many places with missing paint. If you look closely you will also see that the fingers and toes which were 'restored' are very poorly done. Comparing them to the way I work, they were left half (if that) finished.
Anyhow, all damaged areas were cracked out and an appropriate filler was used to recreate the original skin. Most of the damage of this type was over the areas where plaster of Paris was used to cement the two halves of the doll's head or body, etc. together. Plaster of Paris gathers water and caused the skin 'eruptions'. I sealed it first before adding Nancy's new 'skin'.
Next came the 'fine' work. Nancy's hair had waves in it. By cracking out the large area I had to, I eliminated those waves. I have to rebuild them by using a thinned solution of the filler I used on the legs, head, and other. It was a process that took at least five layers.
Here she with every part - head, torso, arms, legs, hands, feet and toes all filled, sanded and sealed before painting begins.
Now comes the detailing. I always use reference photos for this work as I want the doll to look as much like the original as possible. The photo at the top of this post is of an aged Nancy. I had others that showed her hair to have been much more solid originally, and that is what I went with - a lovely deep auburn hair tone that really set off her little face.
One interesting note: replacing a vintage doll eyelash. You can buy old eyes and remove them from the set, but then - of course - you have a one-eyed-lash set left. I usually make mine from old paintbrushes. The trouble with this doll was that the old lash was of an odd color and hard in places. I actually painted and 'aged' the new lash to match as best it could.
And here she is complete and in her original repaired costume.
Nancy has gone home now, but her little friends - Sonja and Grace - have come to visit the doll hospital. I may detail their journeys here as well sometime soon.
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