Eco Resin Doll Companies

Wood is environmentally friendly but if you sand it and breathe it the particles, it's bad for you. Resin being toxic when sanded is the same. No matter what, you should not breathe in particles when sanding something. That's what people mean by resin dust.

I don't believe there to be any such thing as 'environmentally friendly' resin, it's all plastic and I think it's a bit of a con some places want to purport there is such a thing. Maybe 'low toxicitity' or 'low odour' would describe it better, but even so once cured I can't think how it would make any difference. As mentioned above probably just for the workers while it's liquid it's slightly less hazardous.

 

*sigh* "Environmentally friendly" means so many thing this days... In most cases "buy from us if you want to feel good about yourself".
If you actually care about your habits impact environment when buying dolls than first thing you need to do is figure out what the concern is in this specific case:

1. Biodegradable - is your doll going to harm the environment if you throw it in the ocean?
Biodegradability is an issue with throw away packaging and plastic bags because this things are often disposed improperly and end up floating around our biosphere as chunks of plastic. If you plan to properly dispose of your dolls via recycling in case of breakage than this is not a concern for ecology.
2. Waste disposal - is the artist making the dolls properly disposing of byproducts of their work, or are they just tossed in to the ocean/leave somewhere to "not-rot-forever"?
Since doll artists are very small scale "companies" that part is usually highly dependent on their country of residence - some have better disposal facilities available to the public than others. A tiny business like this is going to use public means of wast disposal, so research the country.
3. Using proper safety procedures for the workers - while not directly and immoderately "environmental" you can tell a lot about the care people have for their impact on the world around them by the way they treat thous who come in contact with their work.
Again, most BJD "companies" are a very small scale studio/business of one or two people, it is rear for this kind of arrangements to be careless of the "employees".
4. Offsetting energy use - energy production leads to carbon emissions, some companies choose to "offset" by donating to carbon "scrubbing" initiatives.
BJD production requires less energy than google searches you are doing while researching it... So no specific harm there.

So overall BJD making is a very low environmental impact business, as a result most artists are not going to go through the lengthy process of trying to convince you to buy from them because they are "environmentally friendly" - if you did your homework you know it already. You are not dealing with corporations here, but with small scale studios.

If you really want to go down the rabbi thole than research the resin - thous manufacturers are usually a proper "company" not a studio, and you can check their business practices.
Again - there is no inherently "environmentally friendly polyurethane" - it's harm or lack thereof is in the way it is produced and disposed. Funnily enough in this case the "harm control" is in your hands as end user - make sure you are properly disposing of any broken parts or unwanted dolls and any other non degradable materials you use. As long as we are recycling the materials instead of leaving they laying around they are safe to use.

 

This is mostly for if you're going to be sanding, customizing, or 3d printing things in resin. You shouldn't be getting resin dust off a fully cured completed doll (or anything made in resin!) unless you're sanding it, and in that case, you'd want to wet sand while wearing a proper respirator, just like you'd want to wear when using an aerosol sealant for a faceup. As for smell, that mostly applies to uncured resin. Fully cured resin shouldn't really have a strong smell, and if a doll smells strongly of resin, I'd be worried it's not properly cured!
Unfortunately, there aren't really any international (or even just national in many places, like the US) standards for labeling something "environmentally friendly" or "organic" or "all natural" so getting a satisfactory answer may be difficult, since they're a number of buzzwords used as marketing in many industries. Things labelled "non-toxic" in the US usually means if you eat it, or eat something that has come into contact with it, it's not going to kill you or make you very sick. I have epoxy resin that is labelled non-toxic, but that ONLY applies to its fully cured state. When it's uncured, it's still a health risk and should still be handled with the same safety standards you'd use for other chemicals. I imagine it's a similar situation for the resins being used for the dolls from these companies.

 

That's a pretty good point. I honestly thought it was either green-washing or something forced onto companies by laws (with little to no actual environmental consequence... doll production can't possibly have an impact). But non-toxicity is a pretty big deal since as a doll owner you'll take a whiff of that delicious resin smell pretty often.

I am not entirely sure about the sanding. Non-toxic doesn't mean that it's not deadly when inhaled. There are plenty of substances that are perfectly non toxic that will ruin your lungs (an example is most acrylic paints, they're made with nontoxic pigments, perfectly safe but you still don't want to airbrush without protection). There are foodsafe substances that are deadly if inhaled. I'm pretty sure the non-toxic bit refers to fumes or contact (?)

 

Given the language barriers, translation errors as well as the very different production standards in Asia, environmental, eco and non-toxic resin, sustainable production etc can mean very different things to what we think they do. Even if a PU resin is marked as non-toxic, it is still going to be harmful for people/animals when cast or sanded without PPA and is still going to be not good for the environment if disposed of incorrectly. Maybe porcelain or bisque bjds, being not made from plastic, are a less plastic option but ceramic glazes are still toxic when used or disposed of improperly so... Even if made form the normal pu resin, the made to order nature and the heavy use of second hand market in the hobby offset it way better than making anything in a "greener" material in excess.

As for clothing, shoes, eyes, wigs... they are also usually made to order and use very little material, not to mention people pass them on instead of throwing them into landfills like most worn AND unworn human clothing ends up (shakes fist at fast fashion that is crumbling our planet). Tbh, there is a bigger % of plastic and polyester in human fashion than there is in doll accessories. It is true that there are a lot of things made out of synthetics for dolls but nobody produces fabric or faux leather just for bjd fashion either... and there is a lot of choice for glass eyes, natural fiber wigs and also real leather shoes. BJDs are also a business that doesn't make much profit for the makers, and getting to use "more sustainable" alternative materials or "offsetting carbon emissions" (which is greenwashing through and through) is sometimes impossible because of the price of things.

As for packaging and transport - show me a bjd hobbyist that doesn't reuse all their bubble wrap Dolls do come in cardboard boxes mostly and there are companies that also use fabric pillows with only minimal plastic packaging around the most vulnerable doll parts, though... I end up with more plastic packaging when I buy food for the week tbh New dolls need a long transport route for western collectors mostly but unless one buys second hand locally, there's just no alternative, either. Even if the dollmaker is based elsewhere, most casting happens in Asia because of the price and possibility to cast smaller batches so there will always be carbon emissions involved.


Sorry for the monologue I feel a bit silly about it all as it's such a small hobby with such a small production with barely any leftovers of materials that chasing for extra sustainability in it becomes a bit of a fool's errand imo, and I had a lot of thoughts about it. There are ways to consume within the hobby in a way that uses less plastic for sure, though! Just that it's not going to have much impact because we still have horrible megacorporations and greenwashing politics harming the environment regardless

 

when something costs 500$+ it's not cool to be degradable in any form, I don't think that with that price tag anyone would care for them to even be recyclable , I want to sell part of my collection but I wouldn't even imagine to just toss them in a recycle bin or be happy to let them biodegrade instead of selling them to other collectors and get some of my money back , maybe recyclable would ba cool for playline dolls like barbie but not for high end super expenssive doll who claim to be art , like our dolls are art like van gogh but they have an expiration date and after some years they start to biodegrade by themselves ... the horror

 

PU resin degrades over time as well. Maybe not as quickly as plant ones, or maybe it depends on its exposure to the environment for both?

I kind of lost interest in the topic after however (many years) long it's been since I posted. I feel consumers should also be responsible for their trash, as much as the companies/individuals creating the products. I know my collectibles won't end up in a landfill, but probably not in a museum either. DX

 

Everything degrades over too much time like hundrends of years but bio-degradable has certain parameters that make it degrade in reasonably short time that's by definition one couldn't count something as eco-friendly bio-degradable if it took decades or a century to start degrade that's because this definition is used for things that ARE trash like plastic straws, garbage bags , plastic on-use cutlerry which the sole purpose is to be used once and then tossed away and it's reasonable to want them start degrading no later than 2years of creation and completely gone in a decade,microbes and bacterial forms of life are able to break and destroy that material in molecular level, other stuff like plasic bins for storage or kitchenware for multiple use might start degrading or become fragile after a decade but they are not considered biodegradable cause because microorganisms doesn't play a role there just the natural elements those plastics don't "degrade" but just get slowly destroyed by the environment and natural phenomena. Those categories of stuff are usually recyclable so they can be used without worry they'll degrade but then be put to a recycle bin and instead of ending in a landfill become a prime material for new production. Collectables and highly expenssive stuff are in neither of those categories but p.e. polyurethane matresses can be recycled so maybe dolls can be too but a used matress is full of bacterea acarrea , if someone used it for 15-20 years it might not be healthy to be used and sleep on anymore it might have mold so recycling the plastic is the only reasonale thing to do cause it should be tossed out but a collectible doll I hardly believe anyone would pay the enormous price of a bjd just to throw it to a landfill or even a recycle bin they would sell it .... let's say that I want my collection out of the door today the only thing I have to do is post on marketplace and say I'm gifting everything the recipient just pays the postage cost I assure you I would have more people want a bjd gift than bjd's to gift so yes for cheap dolls like barbie (which still can be sold or collected by collectors if in good condition) it would be nice to be recyclable so when after got bought , end in charity shops , rebought end in an orphanage and sometime completely destroyed that time intsead of ending to a landfill to just get recycled but bjd's well they probably are already recyclabe but get realistic who would do that... as about bio-degradable with faces starting melting/"eaten up" (as trash bags if you observe them biodegrading) from exposure to natural bacteria form in2-5yrs that's stuff for nightmares ..... if dolls had leprocy untreated this would look like it.

 

It is also probable that if any company were to make dolls that were biodegradable they would be made in such a way that only if they are tossed to the elements and nature does its thing they break down, not that they will just break down if they are in your house in a controlled environment.

 

Well that's not biodegradable, biodegradable means it degrades and it's molecules are destroyed and absorbed naturally by microorganisms destruction by nature elements mean it breaks in billions of microplastics that end up in water soil everywhere and stay plastic their molecules are plastic, the way something can be biodegradable is by microorganisms to destroy the molecules those exist in the landfill but also in the air, moisture so yes in house also. The solution is recycling but bjd's don't end up there cause they have value as they are even after 20years contrary to a yogurt cup