Both of the dolls I’ve been working on from my latest mold are finished and ready to find new homes.  This is a long post with many photos, so scroll down to see them all.  You can enlarge  any of the photographs by clicking on them.  If you are interested in buying either doll they are both posted for sale on my website Paula Walton’s A Sweet Remembrance – Plain & Fancy Hand Wrought Goods, or you may email me at paula@asweetremembrance.com or telephone 860-355-5709.

Isa #1 has been SOLD.  Thank you so much for coming to see her.

Isane 2 has been SOLD.

ISA #1 – SOLDSOLD

The paint on this doll’s face has the aged, worn look that you will sometimes see on the paint of certain papier-mache, wooden and cloth dolls.  The base skin paint is intact and smooth, but the the paint on the lips, cheeks and hair has rubbed away from a lifetime of play, and dust and dirt have collected in the depressions and corners of her features.  No doubt left over from her adventurous days of making mud pies.  I was trying for a very refined look of age on this doll.  I know for certain that the original Isa had very little paint remaining on her face before one of her recent owners  covered her with brand new paint (prior to when Edyth – then I bought her) .  I wanted to acknowledge her worn and rubbed off paint.  I also decided to use the Izannah owned by the Worthington Historical Society* as my inspiration for what her paint could have looked like when it was intact.  When I combined those two themes, this is what I got!

                                                                                                           SOLD

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NOW SOLD -Isa #1 is wearing a plum and white print dress made from antique cotton.  The dress has full gathered sleeves, and double, graduated, growth tucks.  It fastens in the back with a drawstring at the neck and an antique plum colored milk glass button at the waist.  Her underwear consists of matching split pantalettes,  a long chemise and a petticoat, all with scalloped hems.  The tops of her black painted boots are also scalloped.  Tiny delicate tatting edges the neckline and sleeves of her chemise.  To protect her fair complexion from the sun, while she is picking strawberries in the garden, Isa is wearing a sunbonnet made from a piece of antique plum colored fabric that has never been washed.  I decided to not to clean the fabric so that it would retain the original sizing, which adds stiffness to the bonnet.  Her hair is painted in ringlets, two in front of each ear and five along the back of her hairline.                                                                                                         SOLD

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                                                                                                          SOLD

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Isa #1 looks ever so much nicer in person.  Her delicate coloring and very old looking paint do not show up all that well in photographs.  Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions about her.  She is $1350.00, which includes her bonnet and free, fully insured, postage within the United States.  She may be placed on lay-away, or she is ready for immediate shipment.  ISA #1 HAS FOUND A WONDERFUL NEW HOME.  IF YOU WOULD LIKE A SIMILAR DOLL, YOU MAY PLACE AN ORDER FOR ONE.  ALL ANTIQUE FABRICS ARE ONE OF A KIND.

ISA # 2 SOLD

SOLD Isane #2 is a very sweet girl with the look of a younger child.  Izannah Walker’s dolls were usually painted with very pale, almost white, skin or with a warmer flesh colored paint.  I decided to paint this doll with the darker coloring.  I left tiny, subtle bits of her stockinette visible on her face.  The weave of the stockinette can only be seen upon close inspection and I love the way it looks.  Being able to see the weave of the fabric reinforces the fact that this is an all cloth doll and it is one of the details I love seeing on some of Izannah Walker’s original dolls.  You will see areas of worn and rubbed paint, as well as subtle variations in the paint color that denote places where the oil from tiny hands would have touched her during her imaginary past life.  This version of Isa has short wispy hair around her face, with a close cropped fringe at the nape of her neck. 

She is dressed in a wonderful thin olive brown and Prussian blue cotton print dress.  The dress has one growth tuck in the skirt, and two tucks in its sort frilled sleeves.  Antique cotton tape forms a drawstring at the neck of the dress and the waist is closed with a mid-19th century, blue painted, milk glass button.  Her chemise and pantalettes are made from antique lace trimmed linen and her petticoat was fashioned from an unworn baby’s flannel petticoat with embroidered, scalloped edges.  I had been looking through scores of images of antique Izannah Walker dolls prior to painting Isa #2 and some of those photographs showed dolls wearing blue shoes.  I took a bit of license and used the inspiration of those blue leather shoes when choosing the color for Isa’s painted boots!   Isa #2’s bonnet is made from a wonderful antique brown and white print cotton fabric.  I’m making the bonnet optional on this doll because I have many other brown dress fabrics that it would also look great with.  Around her wrist is a tiny chain that keeps her sewing scissors near, so that she can always find them when she needs to snip a thread.  She is priced at $1250.00 and you may add the bonnet for an extra $100.00.  Free, insured shipping to any U.S. address is included and of course she can be placed on lay-away if you need to.  Feel free to contact me with any questions you have about this doll.  You may purchase her by calling 860-355-5709, emailing paula@asweetremembrance.com; or fastest and easiest of all, by clicking here and going through the automatic checkout on my website.

Isa #2 is really much better looking in the flesh… or should that be cloth???  🙂

A Few Additional Notes

Before anyone asks again, no I don’t have a bonnet pattern for sale.  🙂  I cut both of these bonnets free hand.  The plum colored bonnet comes purely from my imagination, aided by years of collecting antique bonnets and looking at even more examples in photos, at antique shows and shops, and in museum exhibits.  The brown bonnet is based on a tiny antique doll’s bonnet that I purchased last year.  When making bonnets I take into account the amount of antique fabric I have available, then hold the material up to the doll and start snipping away with my scissors!

Why all of the petticoat scallops?  It’s been cold and snowy here in Connecticut, which has made me long for red flannel petticoats.  A week or two ago I brought out my favorite example, which has a scalloped flounce around the bottom, and that along with the contents of my antique white linens bin inspired the scallops on the girl’s underthings.

*If you would like to read more about the exquisite Izannah Walker doll in the collection of the Worthington Historical Society I suggest you peruse the article about the museum in the February 2013 issue of Antique Doll Collector magazine.