How did you discover bjds?

I found the hobby by randomly searching for a figure set related by my favorite band at the time. I still remember the first gorgeous bjd I saw. After that I was intrigued and started doing research and the rest is history.
Now stuck in a loop looking for my grail lol
I've left other hobbys but always come back to bed.

 

Someone on a forum I frequented posted a link to Soom. I loved the pictures but I couldn’t fathom spending that much money on something I didn’t understand very well. To be honest, I thought it would just end up in a closet because of uncanny valley.

Years and years later, I saw a doll I couldn’t resist and finally bought one. My uncanny valley fears went out the window.

 

I saw a BJD for the first time at a street festival, in a booth with various types of Japanese dolls. At the time I had no idea what I was looking at but I was fascinated by it. The owner of the booth only told me it was a "resin doll". Some time later I saw photos of someone's BJD on DeviantArt and was like "it's one of those resin dolls!!"
So, my initial knowledge on BJDs came from stalking somebody's DA gallery
I bought the book Ball-Jointed Dolls for Beginners (I highly recommend) and researched the hobby more, and got my first doll in 2015!

 

I came across a photo on Pinterest by @MB Lilac which led me to her website. Her wonderful dolls, costumes and stories totally captivated me and the rest as the saying goes "is history". Now 20 dolls later with three more on order, I am forever grateful for the happy chance of running across that first photo .

 

I was really into fashion dolls and OOAK male dolls. Random searches on eBay led me to a Volks Neo Go Guy, which lead me to the Volks website and I fell in love! But there wasn’t much info online at the time (around 2001, probably?) and I was a broke college student. I waited a few years, got an Obitsu 1/6 guy and finally took the dive into resin in 2008. I still have my first doll!

 

Dollfies, years ago. I admired them but they were waaay past anything I could afford, so I kind of forgot about them for ages. Then I saw pictures online of Nobledolls Raspberry like 2 years ago, and was reminded that these kinds of dolls existed. I started looking more into them, and the rest is history. xD

I really got into BJDs at a perfect time, too, since it seems the style of dolls I really love are more popular and available now than they ever were before.

 

The BBC series 'Japanorama' that aired on BBC Three, around 2006 there was an episode that featured a segment on Super Dollfie, Dolpa and the Volks Headquarters. I thought it all looked a bit weird at the time. But that stuck in my mind.

 

I was really into anime as a teen and one day I came across those Black Butler BJDs that IOS did and thought they were stunning. Obviously the price put me off though.
I ended up watching face up and unboxing videos on YouTube though and eventually started saving up.

 

Sometime mid-2005, trawling ebay for Japanese gofun dolls, I ran into both vinyl and resin Volks dolls for sale. At first I wasn't that interested, especially at those prices, but I did end up with a handful of 1/6 Obitsus over the next year. Little did I know what that would lead to.

 

I always have loved dolls. As a kid, my sister and I both loved all kinds but our favorite were Bratz dolls. After Bratz stopped being sold, we had to go back to regular old barbie. At the time we had also just been discovering the internet and one of the things we discovered was anime. I remember loving it. I don't remember how, but one day I saw a video of this beautiful doll. I remember telling my sister "they're beautiful they look just like anime girls, they have robot eyes!" The doll was a Pullip doll. From there I started looking at them. My first pullip was Souseiseki from Rozen Maiden. They made the whole main cast and me and my sister became smitten with them. We loved the anime. After a while our dolls had gotten old, and we had seen online that some people were starting to customize their pullip dolls with new faces, new wigs, and most importantly, new bodies, which finally led us to discovering Obitsu. Just kept evolving from there. From then on it was a literal dream to own a real, resin bjd, but I couldn't get one because I was just a child.

 

I have been collecting and sewing for dolls since I was a kid. As an adult my collection has grown and also changed with time, finances and what has become available with the Internet. I do not and never have liked baby or toddler dolls or enjoyed sewing for adult female bodies, those pesky darts... Adding resin BJD’s was a normal progression in my collecting life.

 

I saw one as Daily Deviation on Deviantart back then!
It was a Migidoll Ryu, namely hiritai's Hayden.
He was crazily popular back then, and I immediately fell in love too.

Found out a friend of mine actually just had started collecting these dolls too and after some humming and hawwing I made the jump.
That was in 2008

 

I started watching monster high doll repaints and got into that. Then the suggested videos were bjd faceups. I got really into the idea of BJDs and was sold when I saw full body dolls and box openings and pose reviews. I couldn't resist and loved the idea of being able to shell some of my characters and I also enjoyed the creative side of it.

 

I saw some on DeviantArt at some point, probably on the front page, and thought "Oh, that's cool." and then promptly ignored them XD A few years later, I thought "Hey, what were those doll things again?" and promptly fell deep down the rabbit hole!

 

I always love hearing how many others got into the hobby from Rozen Maiden lol. I was really into it a kid and I was either just looking up pics of fanart and general stuff on google images, or specifically looking to see if there were any actual dolls made based on the series and, well, the rest is history, I got super super into it and would spend hours looking at stuff on deviantart and blogs and such about them... I didn't join DoA until a couple years later after I'd gotten my first BJD of my own because I was scared of joining the community without owning a doll first haha.

 

Back in my teen years I was browsing japanese fansites, one of them led to a page with galleries of these beatiful dolls. I later found out they were Volks dolls. It wouldn't be for a few more years before I actually got into the hobby. XD

 

When I was at an anime convention in Ohio I was really into Lolita Fashion. I couldn't wear it (not my style) but I always admired those who did wear the fashion. I ran into a con-goer (her username on DoA is BlackRose) who was holding a doll with the same outfit as her. I thought it was a mini fashion doll, she explained it was a BJD then just hit me with so much information that I ended up getting more confused than clarification. Then she pointed me to this forum, that evening I joined this site and the rest is history.

 

I saw my boyfriend skyping with his friend and he had a bjd on his desk. At first I thought it was odd but two years later and I’m in deep.