A Tale of Two Restorations: Part 1 Lily

Today I thought I’d share with you the story of Lily and Emmaline, and the journey we shared.  Lily and Emmaline are two very wonderful original antique Izannah Walker dolls that came to me for restoration.  The following is the tale of how they returned to their true selves and regained a glimmer of their youth.

Part 1 Lily’s Story

(Move your cursor over the photographs to read the captions.  Click on the photographs you wish to enlarge)

When first purchased.

After removing facial overpaint

One day, out of the blue, my dear friend Susie called to tell me that she had purchased an antique Izannah Walker doll.  The doll was in such bad shape that no one else at the doll show she attended was interested in buying her, even though some people did realize that she was one of Izannah’s dolls.  Chief among several issues was the very heavy repaint on the doll’s head and shoulders.  Thinking that she certainly couldn’t make the doll look worse than she already did, Susie gathered her courage and began removing layers of paint.  Finally working her way down to the remains of Lily’s original layer of face paint.  What emerged was a charming, classic pre-patent Izannah Walker doll.  In due course Susie and Lily journeyed to Connecticut and it was agreed that Lily would stay to visit my family of Izannahs while I endeavored to bring back some of her former glory.

This is Lily when she first arrived at my studio. Note the missing paint on her facial features, the poorly made flat replacement arms, the glued on stockinette covering her original shoulders and the sewn on stockings and leather shoes.

Full back view before restoration.

A close up of Lily’s face and the bodice of her dress before restoration.

Where to start???  One of the challenges I faced with Lily was the glued on, painted piece of stockinette that someone had applied over her entire shoulder area. Obviously there was some reason that they felt the need to do that, but why? I decided to see if I could remove the glue saturated fabric.  Starting in an unobtrusive spot under the edge of her second skin I gently began chipping away very small bits of stockinette/glue/paint.  This was an excruciatingly slow process.  The ill considered repair disappeared a fraction of an inch at a time, to reveal Lily’s original shoulders.  There was a small torn area up near her neck, which I repaired with a little piece of antique fabric.

Glued on repair fabric went from neck to chest and was heavily painted.

The neck edged of the glued on stockinette was also sewed in place.

Test area to see if I could remove the glued stockinette.

Close-up of neck edge.

Oh so slowly getting down to Lily’s real shoulders.

The small hole hidden under all that glue, stockinette and paint.

Taking apart a decayed silk quilt block to salvage the antique cotton fabric underneath.

After removing the silk stitch by stitch I came up with an extremely close match to the cotton fabric that Lily’s shoulders are made of.

Fabric comparison. Looks good!

The final repair! Much less intrusive, it leaves her original structure visable and supports weak areas from underneath.

I used some of the same antique quilt block foundation fabric to make Lily a new pair of arms in the proper size, from a pattern drafted from one of my own antique Izannah Walker dolls and re-scaled to fit Lily’s petite size. After making Lily’s new arms I gave them an appropriate amount of wear and multiple coats of paint that I hand mixed to match her remaining original paint.

Next came the thrill of doing a small amount of judicious in-painting on Lily’s face and shoulders.  Brushing on many whisper thin coats of hand mixed color, always making sure not to get any paint down into the cracks in her paint surface.  Susie is very found of Isabeau, one of my antique Izannah Walker dolls, and we found that when we compared Isabeau and Lily that Lily looks like a smaller version of Isabeau.  Both having been made originally from very similar head molds.  Since all of the paint on Lily’s features was long gone, I took Isabeau to the studio, where she sat with me and modeled as I repainted Lily’s eyes and lips.

The next decision that Susie had to make was whether or not to leave the sewn on stockings and shoes from an earlier repair.  I could tell that Lily’s ankles had once again separated along the seam line, and while the socks were keeping her feet from falling off, they were dangling loose under the red stockinette.  After much consideration it was decided that I should remove the red “socks” and little leather shoes.  When I did I was very pleased to find that Lily had painted shoes!  Not painted boots, but low top shoes.!!!  The original paint did not go above the ankle seam.  This is a fairly rare detail and it made my whole day when I uncovered it. 🙂  I was able to repair Lily’s feet with a few stitches to keep her worn “shoes” in place over their horsehair stuffing.  I used small strips of the antique quilt block foundation to make bands to stabilize her ankle seams.

Red “socks” and leather shoes, a previous ankle repair.

Here you can see that the ankles are detached from the feet underneath the socks.

After removal.

The bottoms of the legs that were hidden underneath the sewn on “stockings”.

Feet just laid in place. Note the height of the shoe paint.

Before reattaching the shoes, I carefully made a muslin pattern for future reference. It is important to keep records in case this doll should need additional restoration in the future and also for the dolls I reproduce.

Adding the support bands of antique cotton fabric.

The finished ankle repair.

After getting sweet Miss Lily back to her true self, I turned my attention to her clothing.  She came with a hand sewn red cotton dress trimmed with black velvet ribbon.  The dress is not as old as the doll and while it was made with love, it was not made by an expert seamstress.  The dress also had a great deal of sun fading on the front.  Normally I would not be concerned with the fading, because that is just one of those things that happens to fabric…  However, the dress was quite short and Susie wanted the hem let out if possible.  I tried to find a piece of old black velvet ribbon with similar wear so that I could add it as a second row of trim along the crease of the original hemline (once the hem was let out).  I looked for quite a long time without success.  I wound up letting the hem down, then removing all of the ribbon trim so that I could wash the dress.  Normally I use cold water to wash antique fabrics, but in this instance I used warm, hoping that the red dye would run and even out the  color.  It did run, but the fading was still very evident, as was the fact that I let the hem down.  So I wound up re-dying the dress to it’s original turkey red color.  This evened out the color enough so that it is now acceptable.  Then I sewed the black ribbon back in it’s previous positions, because even after dying the lines where the ribbon was were quite visible.  I also moved the hooks and eyes at the waist to make it smaller.  The dress fits Lily much better now.  since Lily did not come with undergarments, I made her a set from antique fabric and antique waved braid (rick-rack).  As I’ve mentioned Lily’s mom is very fond of my Isabeau, so I recreated Isabeau’s chemise, then made a petticoat and pantalettes to match.

See the fading that is still very much evident after the dress was washed.

Restored dress.

This is much closer to the dress looked like when it was new.

Chemise with handsewn antique rick-rack.

Petticoat with tucks and muktiple rows of waved braid.

More rick-rack trims the pantalettes.

Lily shows off her new chemise.

Underwear that is almost pretty enough to wear as a dress. 🙂

I thoroughly enjoyed having Lily stay here during her transformation.  My doll family is going to be crushed when she leaves, as they have all become fast friends.  I’m sure they will be pen pals for life.

“Lily we are so happy you came to visit.”

Lily joined in all of the doll’s adventures in between restoration sessions in my studio.

Lily is much happier now!

She is ready to kick up her heels and dance!

Lily has enjoyed her stay.

“Good- bye little bed, I’ll miss you!”

In addition to trusting me with Lily, Susie has been extremely generous.  She told me that she wanted me to make reproductions of Lily and she has allowed me to share this story of Lily’s restoration!  Thank You Susie!!!

One of my reproductions of Lily.

This reproduction Lily recently left here, headed to her new home.

Lily and her younger sister pose together. They will live happily ever after at Susie’s house with all of their sisters.

And now we come to the end of this chapter in Lily’s continuing story.  Her restoration is finished and she will be going back home.  All of the pieces of her previous repairs will be going with her, as they are mementos of her long, interesting life.

Newly made hands and arms.

Eyes, lips and a whisper of blush on her cheeks along with her newly revealed original shoulders.

Please come back to visit Izannah Walker Journal next week to read Part Two: Emmaline’s Story.