I have never been to a doll show before. What about you?
No me neither. I just live her in the hall.
No me neither. I just live her in the hall.
We were both going to see what was for sale, meet other fashion doll collectors and hopefully meet some other blogger from the area. The last two things didn’t happen. Hey, if you were at the show, let me know! We took the Broad Street Subway from Fernrock. Parking is center city is a nightmare! KiKi has never taken the sub.
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KiKi at the sign in table waiting for show to open.
We arrived before they opened like any good collector. We waited with the others who were hoping to get in early. We wanted to be the first to purchase. Last year I got there right after they opened. I just missed the Diana Ross Barbie!
Ms. Hayes was there! She was so busy showing and selling dolls that she was a blur. My photography didn’t help either!
She has some collector dolls for sale like: Byron Lars dolls...
This Mackie doll...
She also had a large variety of other Barbie, fashion, celebrity dolls and action figures. She had this action figure there! This is the first time I have seen him!
He has several pionts of articulation.
Close up!
She was discounting her items to move! I purchase a few things. She was aslo discount her thing that were puchased for the children who attended the show. She want to help start the next generation of doll collectors! That was important for her!
There were a few others selling Barbie and 1/6 scale things like this vendor
There were some dolls and some outfits.
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I purchased this outfit.
I wanted this one but didn't get it.
This Tatiana has a better size head than Mattel's version does.
This vender was very nice but I can't find her card with her name!
More boths and vendors!
This doll was cute!
MJ was there too!
Hey Muff, close your eyes here!
This seller has doll that look like real live babies. They are made of silicon and feel and jiggle like a living baby. The eyes are the best for looking human. I saw someone holding one. You really had to look hard to tell it wasn’t a really baby. So, you either love these dolls or they creep you out. I don't think I would buy them but they were interesting.
I just love her!
Too cute!
This doll looked like she was asking for something!
The perfect baby--cute and no requirements!
She looks so real in person
class
One class for chidren
While waiting there I ran across this article on Eunice Johnson-Co-founder of Ebony Magazine. I didn’t know she had passed. I was temped to take it with me because it was there to be cut up but didn’t. I was nice to read.
So, On The Real!
I like the real deal on any situation; so I am giving you my opinion on the show. It didn’t seem international (I could be wrong) and it was more of a sale than a show! There weren't as many classes as I remembered there being in the past. Not as much education as the past either but I wasn’t there for that anyway. There weren’t as many doll vendors as I have seen prior either. So for me, it wasn’t as good as I remembered when I purchase my Shani dolls. One visitor said to me that she could remember when the show took up a larger space at the Convention Center than it did this year. I guess that is a sign of our economy.
It has moved back to the Convention Center this year. Last year it was held on Temple University Campus. To me it seemed larger there but it wasn’t as well lit as the Convention Center.
There were maybe 3 or 4 vendors with 1/6 dolls or items along with their other things. No strictly1/6 venders. No FR dolls there! It was more of a sales event of handmade dolls than fashion dolls. That was why I hadn’t come in several years before last year. It took me less than 30 minutes to look around and see what I wanted. Most had everything that they had out. A few let me look at what they had as backups. What did I purchase? That’s for a future post!
The show could have benefited from more people like Chynadolls there and limbe dolls there. Not sure if they would have made a profit. I wonder if other doll shows are the same. Please let me know. This kind of pushes my need for a local doll club. So I will try to schedule a meeting in September.
14 comments:
Great coverage! Your photos give a good feel for how the show was set up. Congratulations on getting your coverage up first ;-D
I enjoyed hearing about Kiki's new experience and your "real deal" comments.
Hi Ms. Leo, it seems that they have a lot more 1/6 dolls than they did years ago. I went in '98. I saw only two 1/6 dolls and I purchased both (Pizza Hut Skipper and a Integrity Candi doll). They had mostly artist dolls. I love the baby dolls...so cute! I can't wait to see what you bought.
Ughhh! I looked anyway and was traumatized, lol!
You know, even back in the day, doll shows were really doll sales. I've been to lots of conventions, ie, comic, Xena, SciFi, etc. and they were SHOWS. Sure there was a vendor area, but there was so much more entertainment.
I'm not sure how I would expect a doll show to be different though. You mentioned educational classes, but we didn't have those back then.
I think a doll/craft SHOW would be awesome. I would love a class on how to repaint, reroot, dio set up, etc. Stuff like that, as well as the opportunity to buy custom items.
It looks like a lot of fun though. Good for Kiki
Hi Ms. Leo,
Thanks for your report on the show. It was really helpful to see all your pictures. I only started going to doll shows last year so I don't have much experience to compare them with but the two I went to last month were not as big as the two I went to this time last year. I think the economy has significantly reduced the amount of money people have to spend on collectibles. At the same time I think that many sellers who are downsizing due to the economy have unrealistic ideas about what their items are worth in the current market.
The poor economy also makes the risk of renting a booth much higher. I think that's why there have been fewer vendors at the shows. I made enough money at the Atlanta Doll Collectors' show to cover the cost of my booth but that came from the accessories I was selling. I didn't sell any dolls. I might like to try selling at the Philadelphia doll show next year, though.
Hi Ms. Leo,
Thanks for the photo and written recap of the 23rd International Black Doll Show and Sale. I enjoyed seeing Linda Hayes and her doll offerings and so wish you had gotten the name and/or business card of the vendor with the vintage black dolls. I saw some interesting pieces on her table.
Barbara's annual doll show, workshops, exhibitors, and attendees have all dwindled in recent years. In spite of this, I applaud her efforts to 1) maintain the Philadelphia Doll Museum (which is probably no easy feat with the lack of funding and community support), and 2) to present black-doll collectors with at least one black doll show they can count on attending annually.
While other shows may offer a variety of mostly non-black dolls with collectors' ability to rub shoulders or almost rub shoulders with renowned doll artists and also have an option of attending their various workshops and breakfasts, for the black-doll collector and for those who collect only one doll genre, shows like Barbara's work. The cost of these other shows is usually quite exorbitant from $200 to $300 up just to register, the price of which might include a doll and quite often for me would not be the type of doll I collect.
So in comparison to the larger mainstream conventions, I am happy that Barbara continues to produce her black doll show annually where collectors and artists of said dolls can count on gathering annually minus exborbitant registration fees for collectors. If I lived nearby, and if I lacked my travel inhibitions, I would be there annually to support her efforts.
I am glad you and Kiki supported her this year.
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Thanks for all the pictures. So glad Kiki got to go. All of the doll shows, I've been to have been about sales. When I've gone to doll conventions, they were more about showing and education, but they were a lot more money than the $5 entry fee to get into a doll show. Doll shows have definitely changed as the economy has changed. A lot less vendors. Some have gotten out of the business completely. Some can't justify spending table fees, gas money, and sometimes hotel fees, to get to a show, knowing people aren't spending money on dolls the way they used to. Our doll show table fees aren't that expensive, but $100 spent for 2 tables, is $100 that you have to make up in sells before you can start seeing a profit. The Philadelphia show used to be really expensive to participate in. I don't know what the fees are like now.
Loved the silicone babies. I bought a silicone preemie about 6 yrs ago from a doll show in Washington DC. We rode back on the subway and everyone thought it was real. Even when I said it wasn't they didn't believe me. Muff would be happy that I at least got him for a great price because his coloring was a little off.
Thanks again for helping us be a part of the fun.
Hello from Spain: I love to see pictures of this convention on the dolls. In my countryis not held any act like that. It is a good opportunity to meet other collectors and buy dolls from other years. I love the babies seem real children but I have not any. In my country, these babies are very expensive. these dolls are known for Reborn. Keep in touch.
Say, Ms. Leo, did you see a paper doll workshop? I thought that there was to be one there. I did not check for myself, but I thought that there was to be one. Shrug.
Thanks again for covering this event. Nice to see a different perspective on it ;-D
Thanks for sharing these photos! I've never been to a doll show, and I'd really like to go.
I forgot to add in my original comment that the lifelike babies are by doll artist, Laura Tuzio Ross.
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Thanks D7ana, Georgia Girl, Muff, Sergio, limbe dolls, dbg of BDE, Vanessa, Marta and Roxanne!
Sergio, KiKi sends you a kiss!
KiKi enjoyed getting out and going to the show. She may become my new travel doll. Ms. D is just a little too afraid of getting her hair messed to be a travel doll!
D7ana, I can't wait to read what your take on the show was! I saw your photos.
Gang,
I’m all about the 1/6 dolls! The others I might stop for a moment to look at but not my cup of tea. I was really hope for more 1/6 dolls there to add to my collection. So I guess I’m back to the flea markets, thrift stores and internet. For anyone else that feels as I do, if they read this they won’t be surprised when they go. They can enjoy it for what it is.
I do think that the amount of 1/6 sales tables must have really change from the first year I went. The first time I went (I hadn't gone again until last year), Ms. Hayes was there but there were also quite a few 1/6 venders. I met a few people from DC, Virginia, Atlanta and NY selling 1/6 items. There were at least 10 venders with 1/6 items. It must have been a good while ago (before 98) because there was a table there selling Big Beautiful Dolls. The hall outside of the show was filled with vendors too.
I hadn’t gone again also because I didn’t hear about the show for years. I think I stumbled across it the first time. I hadn’t made the connection of Darker Imagers and the Black Doll Museum. Traveled pass the museum for year but didn’t know it was there. A few people who I told about my attending the show hadn’t heard about the show or the museum either. So although the price of 7.00 is not prohibitive, you have to know about the show to attend the show.
I may be looking at it wrong but I guess I am looking at the show from a plant collector/enthusiast point of view. In the plant world , the show producers works with local chapters and the local chapters help to support many of the shows and conventions by producing the education (workshops and classes), volunteering, drumming up the publicity and inviting chapters across the county to come--“come to the show, see the city, stay at my house” kinda thing. I overhead a few people say "she is in the same doll club as I am". So there are some hand crafted doll clubs locally. If someone like Chynadolls or Cyano (both local) had been there doing a workshop, I would have paid to come. Being on the inside of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, I know what they have done to stay viable and keep attendance and participants at the show. It has meant partnering! You have to do even more of it in hard times.
Olá, tudo bem?
Vim fazer uma visita e falar que tem lindas bonecas.....
Também estou convidando você para ir no meu Blog, pois tem um selinho de presente para você.
BJS!!!!!
Hi Ana Belli! Welcome to my blog and thanks for stoppin by. I will go to your blog too.
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