Category: built environment
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Barbie’s ’70s Travelogue, Part IV: “…And I Must Go”
The previous installment being an appendix, you could be forgiven for thinking that the Travelogue had ended–but Barbie’s still got one last frontier to traverse before the decade wraps. (Your appendix is in the middle of your body, too.) Before we tackle the subject at hand, let’s review how Barbie, from her earliest days, attended…
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Barbie’s ’70s Travelogue, Part III: Arrive in Style
In the first two posts in this series, we covered new and exciting destinations that opened their doors to Barbie during the Seventies. Whether it was a ski holiday, a fishing trip, or a beach vacation, while Sixties Barbie could dress for the occasion, only Seventies Barbie ever arrived. But did she arrive… in style?…
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Japan-exclusive furniture (1967)
“There’s lots of fun furniture, too!” enthuses a 1967 Barbie booklet produced for the Japanese market. “Desks, chairs, reception sets, and other colorful furniture with a twist. Have even more fun with Barbie! Yellow dress with red chair… your dreams will fill your heart.” (Translation is very approximate.) And there are pictures, too. Two versions…
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Barbie’s ’70s Travelogue, Part II: Unofficial Adventures
Last time, we looked at play sets representing various far-flung locales frequented by Barbie in the Seventies. While Mattel was shuttling their characters between mountains and beach, other manufacturers concocted their own dream destinations for Barbie and her rivals. Let’s review a few that helped further expand Barbie’s horizons. A-frame Ski Lodge by Omlie Industries…
sheathsensation
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Barbie’s ’70s Travelogue, Part I: The Mountains are Calling
At the conclusion of our Many Abodes of Barbie series, we noted that the Seventies would bring a new focus to Barbie’s built environment, this time outside the domicile. Today we reveal that that focus is travel, and during this decade Barbie exhibited a strong preference for mountain getaways. Consider Exhibit A: Barbie’s 1972 Mountain…
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The Two Abodes of Tammy
In the early ’60s, the glory days of chipboard living, Barbie’s rivals enjoyed rooms and apartments of their own. Tammy, an early competitor from Ideal, came out with a pair of domestic play sets in 1963, hot on the heels of Barbie’s first Dream House. The first of these houses was not marketed specifically for…
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The built environments of mini vintage Barbies
One of the last key topics we have yet to cover in Barbie’s 1960s built environment is this one: miniature environs suited for Barbie-scaled vintage Barbie dolls. Since Barbie is 1:6 scale and 11.5″ tall, we’re talking about dolls that are 1:36 scale relative to a human, standing just a hair under 2″ high. Note…
sheathsensation
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Cafe Today (1971)
Sixties Barbie was all dressed up with few places to go. There was the Little Theatre, but what’s “dinner and a show” without dinner? A show? Barbie’s only known 1960s eatery was not much of a restaurant, certainly not a nightclub: the Campus Sweet Shop was where Ken took Barbie for malteds, but she had…
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The “built” environments of Whitman Barbie paper dolls
We talk a lot about Barbie illustrations here, and we talk a lot about Barbie’s play sets and furniture, but what about the built environments within Barbie illustrations? In our posts on Whitman paper dolls we featured some paper doll folder interiors that show Barbie’s home or place of work; in fact, there are many…
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Unique Boutique (1971)
During the second half of the Sixties, Barbie was a total homebody: following the release of Skipper’s Schoolroom in 1965, Barbie went through about a dozen homes, but no more public spaces. When she was finally ready to reemerge in 1971, it was into a different world. Between the years 1963, when Barbie’s Fashion Shop…
Silken Flame 