Thursday, July 30, 2009

Where are the Asian Fashion Dolls?

Recent posts on doll blogs I follow (Dolls of Color, Niel’s Dolls) inspired me to see what playline Asian fashion dolls are available today. During the late 1990s and early-mid 2000s, doll companies created Asian fashion dolls as part of their doll line up. I am thinking Get Set Club (Gia), Get Real Girls (Skylar), Smartees (Amanda), and I-Girls (Asia). What Asian fashion dolls are available now?

There were three criteria needed for my Asian playline dolls:

1. that the dolls were by any company OTHER than Mattel (removes Disney/Mattel from the list)

2. that the dolls were under $25 USD

3. that the dolls were in playscale or 1:6 scale

4. that the dolls could still be purchased today


These four dolls met the above criteria:

Playmates’ Asian everGirl who remains on sale at Nick.com

Yue Sai Wa Wa available through mail order from ChinaSprout and possibly still available from local toy stores. (I bought mine from a K B Toys stores several years ago.)

Mei Ling also available from ChinaSprout

Jade Princess (under the Just Girlz line by Sears Holding Corporation) is still on sale at some Kmart stores.


Playmates everGirl and Kmarts Just Girlz Jade Princess




Yue-Sai Wa Wa




Mei Ling




Related online articles:

China Doll entry from Encyclopedia of Contemporary Chinese Culture

Multicultural Dolls: 101 - by Ellen Fitzenrider article from 2004

Yue-Sai Kan article

Note: there used to be a website called "Asian Pacific American Toy Chest" that had extensive information about Asian Pacific dolls and action figures. Loren Javier was the site author; unfortunately that website is no longer directly accessible. Using a trackback website might show images from it.