Madame Alexander Princess Elizabeth outfit - SOLD!

The first item I am offering for sale is an outfit for a 13-inch composition Princess Elizabeth doll, made by Madame Alexander in the late 1930s and early 1940s. The outfit consists of dress, cape, shoes, and handbag, and can be found on page 26 of Marjorie Uhl's Dolls on Review.

As a doll collector I know that being able to see detail is important when buying long-distance. Therefore I've set it up so that you can click on each picture for a full-size version.

The dress is white taffeta with a white net overlay, and may have been laundered at some point. The netting is fragile and has some small holes, but they shouldn't be very noticeable on display.

You can see in this picture that the dress retains its original tag, which reads "Princess Elizabeth".

There are also a few little rust-colored stains. The worst one is in the back and would be covered by the cape. It is shown in this picture:

The cape is red velvet with a red cotton lining, and is in great condition. The grograin ribbon that ties around the neck is a little faded, and the ermine tails have been removed.

The silver oilcloth shoes both have their buckles, soles, and heels. The strap has been cut off of each one to make them slip-on shoes (instead of side-snap or center-snap, as they originally would have been).

The outfit also includes the original white taffeta drawstring handbag. It's slightly yellowed with age, and I don't think it has been laundered.

Missing are the jeweled tiara, socks, and undies.

I am asking $50 for the outfit, same price I paid for it; buyer will pay shipping and handling. Original clothing is difficult to find for these dolls, especially since they are now about 70 years old!

If you are interested in the outfit please email me!

'For Sale' page is live!

You can now browse dolls for sale on Doll Stringing Extravaganza by clicking the link in the nav bar, above.

On this page you will find dolls and outfits in my own collection that I am selling. I will also be happy to post other sellers' listings at no charge — just email me for details.

Coming soon: For Sale page

Like most collectors, I am always refining my collection. As I focus my doll collection more and more, I am always selling off dolls and outfits that I have decided not to collect anymore.

Although eBay has been a great source for my collection, I am dissatisfied with some of their policies and changes over the years. As a result, I have decided to offer items for sale to my readers here before listing them on eBay.

Stay tuned — I'll have the "For Sale" page up soon!

Why I don't publish catalog or doll book pictures

I belong to several Yahoo! doll groups. In one of these groups, members are scanning and uploading pages from doll books they own, as research materials for other members.

The objective is commendable, but I was concerned about copyright infringement, so I spoke up. As a writer, I am all too aware of how many people on the Internet are ignorant about the fact that most intellectual works are protected by copyright. That means that you can't use someone else's words or pictures on your website, without first getting permission or verifying that the works are part of the public domain.

In the case of this group, I offered to research the copyright on the book (because there is a chance it is not protected by copyright), but I also suggested that they make sure the scans are available only to the group members.

Oddly, the responses I received betrayed a lot of ignorance and even a little hostility. I guess some people will do anything they can — even if it means flaming a well-meaning person — in order to avoid acknowledging what they don't want to.

At any rate, as a writer I refuse to infringe on other people's copyrights, because I know from experience how miserable it is when someone does it to me. That is why most of the pictures on my site are ones I have taken of my own dolls. (In the two exceptions, the pictures of Snow White's hair and the Scarlett Elise, I got permission from the photographers.)

Any time a scan or a picture not taken by me appears on this site, you may be sure that either 1) I received permission from the copyright holder, or 2) the image is part of the public domain.

Elise #1610 - 1957

This is another of my favorite Elise dolls, although I've never had to do any restringing or any other work on her — she was in lightly played-with, but perfectly display-worthy, condition when I bought her from a fellow collector/dealer here in Colorado. She is #1610, from 1957, and you can see her in the back row of my new Elise display.

I love the hat on this outfit: a white cloche adorned with a black velvet ribbon and flowers.

My doll also wears (all original) a lovely crispy-mint half-slip, white taffeta undies, hose, and low-heeled black shoes.

But by far the most interesting thing about her is the little braid pinned across her hairline like a headband. Some doll in the 1950s came with an extra braid of hair, in a little plastic canister that was attached to the doll's wrist; in addition to being able to wash and curl their dolls' saran hair, a little girl could also use this braid to create fancier styles.

I didn't know Elise was ever sold with an extra braid like this, but it appears she was, as the braid's color is a perfect match to her wig:

This same Elise is pictured in pink on page 81 Marjorie Uhl's Madame Alexander's Ladies of Fashion.

My Elise Southern belle: Part 3

The last two posts have discussed the history of my undocumented Elise formal and the doll who wears it now. The story of the doll that originally came with it is also interesting, particularly from a doll stringer's point of view.

I mentioned in the post about my Elise wedding doll that I had to put the doll's elbow back together, and that it wasn't the first time I had worked on an Elise doll. In fact, I could take an Elise doll apart from head to toe and put her back together again.

Well, almost. I've never seen the inside of an Elise doll's ankles, but I'm sure if I did I could figure that out, too.

When I bought the Southern belle outfit, it was worn by an Elise who had a broken leg: Her leg had come apart at the knee. This was my very first experience with repairing dolls, but I took the gamble: I assumed I could fix the leg, and purchased doll and outfit for an absolute steal.

Eventually I would find out that I was right, and that I could fix the leg, but it took some time. I ended up dismantling that doll almost completely: I took her hips and her good leg apart, then repaired the "broken" leg and put everything back together again. I also removed her head and arms, as they got in the way when I was working on her hips, and restrung them when I was done. At one point I had that doll in eight pieces on my living room floor!

Ultimately, I decided to sell the doll but keep her outfit. The doll herself was clearly played with, and although I was able to soak the dress to clean and brighten it, there's not much (besides repainting, which ruins the originality of the doll) that you can do for an Elise with a yellow-spotted face (a common problem with Elise dolls).

Although that Elise was technically my first experience with restringing, and definitely the most difficult restringing job I've ever tackled, I don't regret selling her. I am certainly glad I kept the outfit, though — especially seeing as how pretty it looks on its new owner!

My Elise Southern belle: Part 2

In my last post, I talked about my undocumented Elise yellow formal. I went into a lot of detail, partly because I've never seen the outfit documented, and I'm sure there are others out there who could use some information on it.

Now I want to tell the story of the doll who is wearing the outfit in my new Elise display.

I bought this doll about four years ago. Her blond hair is still tightly contained in the original set; her face paint is perfect, with beautiful soft pink lip color and blush. She came with her original silver low-heeled shoes that had (unfortunately) been painted with gold airplane paint, a pearl necklace, a pair of net and lace gloves, and a dingy veil and blue lace garter that were clearly not original.

I originally bought her to wear an Elise bride dress that I have, but I never completed the outfit. When I went through my dolls recently, I decided she ought to wear the yellow Southern belle outfit, which had been another doll — a redhead with mussed hair — for several years. I switched the outfit, and the transformation was amazing: Whereas the outfit looked played with and imperfect on the mussed doll, on the perfect doll it practically glows!