Ever walked down a children’s toy aisle and been confronted with the glamorously overdone faces of dolls for six year olds? Please don’t lose hope for the world just yet: three companies are striving to create dolls that build girls up with representations of natural beauty—and the best news is, they’re becoming popular products.
You might remember the guy who created Queens of Africa to make his niece proud of the way she looked. The beautiful dolls usurped Barbie in Africa because they actually resembled the skin tone of the children playing with them. Bonus: The company encourages reading through books they’ve written for each doll.
Lammily completely changed the game in the US: She was created to look just like America’s average girl—her height, shape, etc. are all in ratio with the women we see on a daily basis. The project was so loved by the public in its early days that it was crowd funded on Kickstarter, and more than 13,621 backers pre-ordered over 19,000 dolls.
Australia’s Tree Change Dolls were rescued from shops and lovingly given faces stripped of the artificial makeup they were “born” with. Upscale heels were swapped out with shoes molded by hand and sparkly dresses were replaced with more realistic outfits. Although Sonia Singh didn’t intend to create a movement, once the “makeunders” went viral, she quickly became an inspiration. You can check them out at Tree Dolls’s tumblr page or on twitter @treechangedolls.
Images c/o Tree Change Dolls, Queens of Africa, and Lammily websites
