This is a Schoenhut doll. She is all wood and jointed with a cool system of springs.
She has a dangling arm and lots of paint issues.
She has lost her eyebrows and much of her eye paint.
Unfortunately she has met someone who painted over her mouth. It is not a bad paint job but she originally had different colour lips that were parted to show a row of teeth. The dark red mouth bears no resemblance to her original.
The worst of the paint damage is seen here. You can also see her carved hairbow and it's remnants of blue paint.
Here is the insides of the dangling arm. The rod is supposed to have a spring on it.....it has gone missing. The loop on the rod gets held in place in the upper arm with a nail.
I have found a few potential replacements.
Spring chosen and altered to do the job.
Here she is with her arm re-attached.
Some clothes help her look less beat up?
The dark red overpainted lips have been removed and remnants of her original smile are visible.
The question now is how much restoration to do to her?
Schoenhut dolls were meant to be played with and many show the marks and dents of years of love and play.
Many collectors like keeping these dolls in all their battered glory.
Many prefer they get restored...at least the visible facial defects.
As this doll is one of my own, she will sit like this for a while as I contemplate how much, if anything, to do to her.....
Hey! I was wondering if you sew fashion doll clothes at all? :) Your doll restoration is amazing.
ReplyDeleteWell! apparently I cannot type and my first posted reply was full of typos!
DeleteThanks Amber.
I sew clothes for any type of doll that needs something to wear. I am slow at the sewing bit though!
Darci i think she deserves to be restored basically because shes unusual and it would be nice to see her restored as she was originally painted x
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ReplyDeleteWow I have just found your blog and am amazed at how wonderful your restorations are. I'm in the UK and would love to learn how to do doll restoration, do you do classes & do you have a website?
ReplyDeleteThanks Diane :-)
DeleteYou can learn doll restoration with patience and perseverance. Classes where I am in Canada are non-existent so I learned to do by doing. And trying. And doing over my bad results. Sometimes many times!
I would be happy to coach you through a first doll restoration. You need a beat up doll of minimal value to start.....
Thank you, I'm in Scotland and there are no doll restoration classes where I am either so I was thinking I might take a trip to the USA or Canada sometime to do one. Do you know if there are any good doll restoration books?
Delete"The Handbook of Doll Repair and Restoration" by Marty Westfall is a good starting guide.
DeleteThank you. x
ReplyDelete