A Reliable Composition Doll

 

This is a composition and cloth doll made by Reliable, a Canadian doll maker.

She doesn't look too bad?

But, she has some significant paint lifting and cracking in the facial area.

The only way of repairing this is to remove the lifting paint and then repainting the bare areas.

She has lifting and missing paint on her limbs too. A couple of partial finger amputations.

Her cloth body is not in bad shape other than some repairs at the shoulder seams.

The first step is usually decapitation.

Followed by a total separation of all her parts.

Here we have her head after all the lifting and warped paint has been removed.

Not much left!

All her parts have now been stripped of lifting paint.

Next is filling in any defects and rebuilding a couple fingers.

While her composition bits get filled and primed, her wig gets styled.

First, a comb out.

Mohair gets quite fluffy after a comb out!

Filling and priming are done so she is ready to get her skin tone applied.

She has her skin tone applied and her newly curled wig attached. That is quite the hair!

These dolls would have been sold wearing a dress and bonnet. Only some of those curls would have been visible.