With the release date of Gentle River quickly approaching, I’ve been reflecting on how much work and time has gone into this doll. We had no idea when we were told that our Blythe would be produced that CWC was going to let us work on absolutely every step of the process – from designing new shoes to laying out her packaging. I thought it would be fun to give our friends a peek at the ideas that went into the original Gentle River, and a hint of what’s to come in the production doll.

On a lazy Saturday morning in October 2005 (Paul’s birthday, to be exact), I checked my email and received a very long message from Christina asking me to be on her team for a Blythe beauty contest that I hadn’t even heard of. At that point, I had done a couple of custom girls for Christina, and she had made me some amazing Jam Fancy clothes, but we hadn’t collaborated. Buried in that long note was this line:

The tiniest possibility of having a doll made of the winning entry has got me interested.

That sealed it for me. I was so excited about getting to do a doll together, that my response was a very ladylike “F*&@ YEAH!”. We recruited Paul for his airbrushing and detailing skills soon after, and then the brainstorming began.

The toughest rule of the contest was that her head could not be opened, so that limited our design right away, but also gave us a more concrete starting point – We had to start with a girl with gorgeous hair. We all love redheads, so we all settled on Merry Skier because her long flowing hair gave us more options.
Settling on the outfit was tricky. None of us owned Merry Skier, so we had to order her and wait for her to arrive. Trusting Christina’s fabric and outfit design sense, she took on most (well, just about ALL) of the responsibility for the outfit. She seemed to know structurally exactly what would work – Layered dress, pinafore, fitted coat, tiny hat. We got stuck though, between two color schemes – red and black or green and brown. Red and Black are safe colors for Christina – Red, pink, and black are at the heart of so many of her designs. We told her flat out that we wanted the outfit to be very “her,” but at the same time wanted to see her stretch a bit. I remember pushing the green angle back at her a few times. She had a few moments of doubt:

I gave browns and greens and Autumn shades a go, but they seemed to keep looking…..well…soppy somehow.

At this stage Im looking at blacks and reds again…

I keep seeing her with her thick bangs and short curls and somehow she comes off sassy in these colours, and it feels more like my kind of look. I also worry that if I do any applique kitties or other animals on the coat with the dress less sassy feeling that its going to come off a bit saccharine sweet…

She put together two color mock-ups. The Black and red one was beautiful, and very classic Jam Fancy, but we really liked the unconventional mix of greens, golds, and burgundys that the second one had. Just to be sure though, Christina produced both dresses before making the final decision. Our Merry skier finally arrived, and seeing it on her completely sealed it – the green and brown dress was a perfect match, and the Forest theme started shaping up. After the arrival of the doll, new pieces just kept flying from Christina’s hands – one message came with pictures of a pinafore with sweet appliques, the next – an amazing coat with animals romping on the forest floor, then of course, her little pet deer.

After the main pieces of the outfit were made, Sar Sar of Blanki Blue was added to the team to create the perfect Crocheted shell-hat for our still un-named doll. She cranked the piece out so quickly and perfectly that we didn’t need any revision or further adjustments. She also made a beautiful and delicate floral scarf that didn’t make it into the final submission, simply because we had so many pieces!

Finally, the doll and all of her accessories were rushed to California for hair, makeup, and photos. We were down to the final month before the submission was due, so we could not afford to mess up the doll. First to go was her eyechips and lashes. We got a particularly gluey Merry Skier, and her chips would not budge! Since we couldn’t open her, we had to soak her entire head. I boiled the water so hot that I was worried about melting her face, but eventually, the chips let go and she was not harmed. Once her chips were out, she was ready for makeup. We wanted to show off with some bold colors, but since the contest was about “natural beauty,” we knew that we had to make sure that it harmonized well and suited her personality. We chose a very bold green shadow and muted it a bit, to carry the gorgeous mossy green color up from her coat. Since our girl lived in the woods, we wanted to give her very blushy cheeks as if she had just come in from the cold, and a strong lipcolor to accent her red buttons and the colors from her hat. In order to paint her eyeshadow without taking her apart, Paul employed some fancy masking. Paul applied her blush in such a way that the overspray gently hilighted her nose and ears.
Once makeup was done, custom eyechips were cast to match her theme – bright blue like the color of a river reflecting the sky, mossy green, crisp stone gray. As an ode to her blythe roots, a special set of “kenner pink” chips were made.

Back when we were brainstorming for the outfit, ideas for hairstyles were flying around. Very early on, before we even settled on the color of hair, we all turned to our real-life friend Becky (Blastmilk)’s gorgeous red curls for inspiration. We had all decided that sausage curls would suit her style and work well with her hat. Hair styling was ultimately my task, and while Kenner curls are my friend, Takara curls are not! I think I had only done one boil perm at that time, and it was a mushy disaster. I had only one weekend left to finish her before I had to get the photos taken and printed to mail to CWC. She was literally fresh out of the freezer (after boiling her hair, of course) and still in perm rods just hours before the final shots were taken. I was getting pretty nervous that her curls would be limp and fall, or that while shooting her out in my yard, her hair would get snagged on a branch or on the grass and turn into a frizzball. Luckily though, her hair behaved and we got some good shots. The sun was going down behind the hills when I took the last photo, we were out of sun and out of time. I remember praying that I had gotten the required six good shots after snapping about fifty pictures.

we literally settled on a name for the doll and the name of our team on the last day before mailing in our submission:

4-5-06
me: we shoulda done this last weekend! i suck so bad at names
me: christina named the doll “river” but i like “fawn” too
me: i think we should do a name similar to the style of name takara gives their dolls
paul: yeah
me: we need an adjective, like “merry skier”
paul: honey river
paul: cocoa river
paul: palm frond
me: haha
me: i will just put down “river” for now

Meanwhile, Christina and Paul came up with “Team Sibley.” At the last minute, I dropped the word “gentle” in there and sent the porfolio of prints on its way to the contest.

As we waited for the announcement of the finalists, we realized that the “no-head-opening” rule that seemed like such an obstacle was actually a great thing. The doll we had in our hands was nearly factory-perfect. The limitation forced us to really fine-tune our techniques. Now that RBL is out, it’s not such a big deal, but having a custom that isn’t all chopped up and re-assembled at the scalpline makes such a huge difference in the finished product.