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Welcome!
Thanks for swinging by my vintage Barbie fan site, where you’ll find articles on Barbie’s built environment, Barbie illustrations, vintage rival and clone dolls and playsets, and miscellaneous musings/deep dives. What are you looking for?
Vintage Barbie Illustrations
- Mattel fashion booklets, 1960-67 (approximately)
- Basic and Dressed Doll Boxes, 1959-64
- Doll Carrying Cases, 1961-72
- Jumbo Trading Cards, 1962
- Gift set art, 1960-70
- Illustrated fashion packaging, also about 1960-70
- Random House books (plus some from other publishers), 1962-65
- Dell Comics, 1962-63
- Whitman Paper Dolls, 1962-65 and 1967-73
- Whitman Coloring Books, 1962-65 (A mod sequel post is possible but not planned at this time.)
- More crafts and hobbies, 1963-1971
- Queen of the Prom board game, 1961-63
- Keys to Fame board game, 1963
- Sew-Free Fashion Fun Kits, 1965
- Sewing Patterns, 1962-?
- The Barbie World of Fashion board game, 1967
- Barbie’s best friend has a post of her own, mostly showcasing illustrations: Visions of Midge.
Plus the illustration “sidebars,” short entries on niche topics:
- Busy Gal fashion sketches, 1960
- Barbie Sings!, 1961
- Go-Together furniture sets, illustrated
- Color Magic, 1965-66
- Mattel fashions for Julia, 1968-69
- All the Barbie and friends illustrations on mod house exteriors like the one below
- Miss Lively Livin’ board game, 1970
- Window shopping, illustrated
- Barbie’s Baggage, illustrated (not super short, but surveys many illustration categories examined in other posts)
- Vintage dress-up and other child-size items for the boudoir
- The illustration component of the 1964 Little Theatre and travel costumes entry is sidebar-sized.
Barbie’s Built Environment
- Entries by year for many of Barbie’s early abodes: 1962, 1964, 1965, 1966, 1967-68, 1969, 1970.
- Barbie’s ’70s Travelogue:
- Mattel Modern and Susy Goose furniture, 1958-1966
- Barbie on TV, a roundup of some of Barbie’s early toy TV sets (this post also has a strong “illustration” component)
- Barbie’s Fashion Shop, 1963
- and a detour into Mannequins and Dress Forms, ’63-’73
- The Deluxe Reading Dream Kitchen, 1963 (note, this is not a Mattel product)
- The Little Theater, 1964
- Skipper’s Schoolroom, 1965
- Penthouse apartments, 1964-76
- Beauty parlors, 1964-77
- Japan-exclusive furniture, 1967
- Unique Boutique and Cafe Today, both 1971
- The Sears Karosel Kitchen, 1971-1976 (note, this is not a Mattel product)
- A roundup of fireplaces in Barbie and Barbie-sized houses, 1963-79
- The “built” environments of Whitman Barbie paper dolls, which real Barbie dolls can also use; 1963-1973.
- The built environments of mini vintage Barbies
Articles relating to clones, rivals, and off-brand Barbie-style products
- Rival fashion booklets
- The Two Abodes of Tammy covers the living spaces of one of Barbie’s most notable rivals
- Barbie’s ’70s Travelogue, Part II: Unofficial Adventures is about non-Mattel playsets suitable to Barbie and Barbie-sized dolls
- Clones are recommended in the “existing alternatives” section of the musing, Three Nostalgic Black Barbies We Need (and a few existing alternatives).
- Clone kitchens: The Deluxe Reading Dream Kitchen, The Sears Karosel Kitchen
- Clone washrooms are prominent in Barbie’s ’70s Travelogue: Part IV.
- The pieces on penthouses, beauty parlors and fireplaces include non-Mattel offerings.
- Not Barbie on TV: Barbie and friends’ early TV sets that were tuned to other programs
- The entry on Mattel Modern and Susy Goose furniture includes some offbrand furniture items of the 70s and 80s.
- We wrote about clone carrying cases, including some created for competitor dolls.
- Certain of the sewing patterns are for generic fashion dolls, as are the Sew Simple and Cut ‘n’ Sew craft kits.
Miscellaneous Musings and Deep Dives
- A Chronicle of Barbie shoes, 1959-67
- Barbie’s Seventies Travelogue: the Appendix reviews vintage and nostalgic Barbie and Barbie-sized luggage options
- When Barbie Turned 21 in Manhattan, 1980
- Three Nostalgic Black Barbies We Need (and a few existing alternatives)
- Great Books for Vintage Barbie Fans
- The piece on Skipper’s Schoolroom includes “play sets that never were”: Barbie’s Sixties careers for which environments were not produced.
- Visions of After Five (1962) and Solo in the Spotlight (1960)
- Who wore it best? pairs vintage and mod Barbie and Francie fashions with their likely or confirmed inspirations. The Airborne edition does the same for vintage flight attendant uniforms, while the Mary Quant one highlights Francie fashions that appear influenced by Swinging London designer Mary Quant.
- Millennium Mod catalogs Barbie’s returns to the late Sixties youth-driven zeitgeist between 1980 and 2020.
- We tackle an age-old mystery with our investigation into Sew Free? Sew Magic? Sew Simple? Cut ‘n’ Sew??
There’s still more to come, but before you scroll off into the distance, here’s the first image ever posted to this blog back in 2022: some of my dolls, dressed in vintage or vintage reproduction, in front of vintage Disneyland backgrounds belonging to Bill Cotter:
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Sears Karosel Kitchen, 1971-1976
Spread advertising the Karosel Kitchen in the 1971 Sears Wishbook. Source: christmas.musetechnical.com I’ve seen this funny little kitchen listed as a Barbie playset a couple times and was curious about it. I began my investigation with the handy catalog search feature of christmas.musetechnical.com. Although Sears was not shy about letting you know what doll might use the set, it turns out it was actually not Mattel- or Barbie-branded.
According to the copy in 1971 (above), this kitchen set was based on one demonstrated at the 1970 World’s Fair. I didn’t find many resources about the World’s Fair kitchen prototype, but my searches did lead me to this amazingly detailed Google video about the toy:
Lucky Penny Shop on Youtube explores the Sears Karosel Kitchen of the Future In the video the presenter guesses that he has an early version of the toy because it has a hand-turned crank to rotate the kitchen, instead of the futuristic push-button convenience of other models. However, the 1971 version already has the push-button; we’ll actually encounter the crank later. The presenter also speculates that a device on the middle column (visible on the catalog page at top) might be a microwave, but we know from the catalog copy that it is in fact a video phone. The opposite side of the column features a “computer,” visible in the 1972 wishbook:
Excerpt from 1972 Sears Wishbook. Source: christmas.musetechnical.com This year the accessory set mentioned in the video was also introduced.
While Walking Jamie advertised the kitchen in year one, this year we see Busy Barbie standing well back from the contraption–almost as if she knows which way that hot food on the range will go flying, should anyone press the “rotate” button.
Busy Barbie is put through her paces in the 1973 catalog, operating the washer and dryer and manipulating various dishes.
In 1974 the hand crank appears. This year the set is also produced in Singapore, rather than in Japan as in years previous.
Excerpt from 1974 Sears Wishbook. Source: christmas.musetechnical.com The futuristic kitchen returned in 1975 and made its final appearance in 1976, demonstrated by Malibu Barbie. By 1970, adults were probably already aware that a spinning kitchen was not the way of the future; maybe by ’77 the kids were catching on, too.
Where to next? Explore refined living in Penthouse apartments, 1964-76; check out another off-brand kitchen: The Deluxe Reading Dream Kitchen; on the illustration front, browse Mod-Era Whitman Paper Dolls; or just go up to the Table of Contents.
Silken Flame
Vintage Barbie illustrations, built environment, clones and more
Silken Flame 