Doll Studio: Working on my Queen 선덕 inspired fashion/fusion 한복 Doll

Queen 선덕 inspired fashion/fusion 한복 doll complete!

I made a bunch of rag dolls in a variety of skin tones over the past few weeks. Last week, I was working on hair (and that can sometimes get really tedious). This week, I'm finally working on their clothes. For these dolls, I prefer Three Kingdoms and 고려 inspired 한복 because they are pretty, and so much fun to make. Though they do take a little longer than the 조선 한복 as they have more visible outer layers. Plus, it's harder and more expensive to make and sell Three Kingdoms/고려 한복 in children's and adult sizes. Apparently, not everyone is as enthusiastic about wearing clothes that look like beautiful princess dresses to the office or to school, as I am. So, I make them for my dolls instead.

Artwork by 글림자

The Three Kingdoms and 고려 inspired 한복 are based more on what I see on the 사극, and less on what I've found in an excellent 한복 책 written and illustrated by 글림자. I do want to try and make some designs that are more like the book which are based on historical paintings from the relevant time periods. I found out the hard way that styling my dolls hair to be historically accurate like in this book isn't necessarily that hard, but it's difficult to make it look clean with three layers of sewn in yarn hair. In some cases, I had dolls who looked like they had dread locks. Not quite what I was going for! And one looked like she had granny hair! Some of these hairstyles are also very heavy, and my dolls with historically accurate hair can definitely confirm that, if they could talk!

The pictures above are what inspire the 한복 designs for my Queen 선덕 inspired dolls.

I made this particular doll darker skinned because fans of the 사극 are quite diverse. Before I was banned from Facebook, I had many Nigerian and Indian friends and followers. This doll is dark complected enough to include a variety of ethnic backgrounds who happen to be naturally darker.
I also recall the Chinese Empress Dowager Li Lingrong of the Jin Dynasty who many have speculated to be from Africa. Or the Indian Princess who married a prince from The Three Kingdoms era (I cannot remember the specific Korean Kingdom), according to the 삼국유사. And I wanted to challenge myself a bit. Most of the dolls I have made so far have been light skinned, so I wanted more variety in my collection.

She will be listed on my website soon, so keep checking back!