Even when I am working with brunette or blond hair I'm almost always mixing in something, usually some shade of red or some other bright color so being able to get several shades of colors in the same hair is really important for mixing. I don't pick up a needle just to give a doll basic blond hair style. I mean what would be the point, right? The whole reason we root a doll is to add pizazz not to make it look like your typical blond Barbie on the shelf. If I am doing blond I'm doing 3-5 shades of blond, not one.
I was sitting here tonight actually doing some partial reroot. I did away with the Stardoll redhead's bangs because they annoyed me. Then I rooted my extra Barbie Basics Kayla 1.0 to have partially neon blue hair. Then I started a total reroot on an 80's Barbie who's makeup I've always really liked but whose hair was your typical 80's Barbie tangled blond cotton candy like disaster. She's a long term project but when I am done with her she's going to be very Jem like. I won't have to do much with her eyes, but I plan on adding some flowers or shapes to her face like the Holograms used to have and giving her several shades of colored hair, mainly green, but also blue, pink, and aqua.
Anyway as I was looking at my stash of hair from the beauty shop I had a thought about posting here. This is what I use a lot actually instead of doll hair per se and I've found it works fairly well for me. The rougher types of bulk hair they work well for when I'm doing more textured hair. I use it a lot to get more realistic styles for the AA dolls. The new silky kanekalons I use them a lot when I want long, straighter hair or when I want to curl hair with hot water. Some of the earlier types of hair, the Tokyokalon, you really can't do as much as you can with some of the newer types of synthetic hair. They sometimes come in more neon colors though which can be handy.
When I first started rooting I got immediately warned off using synthetic hair for humans. I was told "Oh it will stain the dolls and it's never as nice as the real doll hair, blah, blah, blah..." Well, all I can say is I don't really think that's all that true. I think some of the people telling me that they just like to sell more doll hair, and okay, that's cool for them, but it's not for me, not on my budget, not as much as I like to do my own thing with my dolls.
It might be just a bit less silky but it's really not by so much anymore. I can put some hair I've actually cut off of older donor dolls right next to it and in some cases (cheap Bratz hair) the bulk doll hair can actually be nicer so there you go. Only once with a rather cheap rough dread style plum weft did I ever have a problem with the hair staining the doll and for the record I tend to use almost every red out there pretty much all the time.
Usually I test a bit of the hair in water overnight to check for color fastness but I can't say that except in that one instance that I've ever had any issues at all with the kanekalon colors. As I recall that was another early type of synthetic fiber entirely and I have a feeling the color might have actually been sprayed onto the plain black dreads after the fact, not dyed into it. I've seen that brand and type since but now I just avoid it. It's not even an issue really as I don't really like working with most of the pre-made wefts anyway.
I'm actually starting to make wigs now myself. Shoes too. I'm tired of looking at websites with wigs and shoes and stuff in all kinds of interesting colors and styles that I just can't really afford. While I admire those. They are really nice usually, they're just not really something I can afford to put on my dolls all the time. Of late you have people selling long haired wigs for like $40 and up. Ouch. It's like every larger fashion doll out there is suddenly supposed to be a Sybarite now or something. I can sometimes buy a Tonner type doll on clearance for less than I can buy a flaming red wig lately. It's just getting too expensive for me.
The way I see it in order to keep collecting and making my dolls interesting I either have to learn to do it all myself or give it up. So I am learning to sew doll clothes. I am learning to make wigs, to root, even to make shoes and I'm actually having some fun. I do have my share of major disasters, sure, but finding cheaper alternatives to get the job done, seeing the results of my work getting better over time? I don't think that's something I can really buy.
I'm sitting there tonight looking at a pile of packs of red hair that would do The Little Mermaid proud and I'm finally realizing that I can do just about anything with this new kanekalon stuff that I can do with real hair. I'm looking at all these neon colors and thinking I can Tokyo Pop all my dolls or Jem them out and there's nothing stopping me but the limits of my own imagination. Pretty cool, I think, don't you?
I think one of the main reasons I finally joined up here is because you all are such a creative bunch and you're not exactly snobby about it either. Silk or socks, whatever the dress gets made of it's all good. Carving shoes out of cork or casing them in resin whatever works is fine. Molding doll heads out of polymer that is pretty darned cool from where I am sitting. Using bulk hair instead of doll hair? I'm sure it's okay with you guys from what I've seen. $1 thrift doll or $500 BDJ all the dolls get their fair share applause here.
Anyway, anyone who wants to pop up and talk about using Kanekalon bulk braid here be my guest. But this is what I do. Ask questions if you want to, and thanks, all of you for inspiring me to think more outside the box when it comes to doing things with my dolls.
