Rare dolls of today?

One of my dolls is an artist sculpt that seems really uncommon here? I don't actually know anyone else who has one and it's a shame, because I'd love to gush more about him to others who feel the same way about the sculpt. (The artist is Siwoo.)

 

I think there are a lot of "rare" dolls in terms of no longer in production, were limited at release, etc., but I also feel like "rarity" also comes from how much it is still sought after. If we're looking at just strictly no longer in production and therefore few remain, there's a lot that fit that category. But in terms of rare and highly sought after...that's a little more interesting.

 

I have a perfect example of this. When Dollzone released their MSD sized flower dolls, Moment and Anson, (see my avatar) they were unlimited. The company had so many issues with broken petals, they were suddenly discontinued after only 3 months! Because they were “unlimited”, many who wanted them waited and missed out entirely. I can’t count the amount of wtb posts I’ve seen in the marketplace over the past decade.

 

I got very lucky and snagged a Bychkova doll secondhand! Even the resin ones painted by someone else and sold nude, like my girl, don’t show up often. They’re technically not as rare as some other dolls- I think 150-200 were sold -but a lot of the owners aren’t involved in the community. Which is another rarity factor to consider, I suppose- just because you don’t see it, doesn’t mean it’s not out there.

 

I think there are few kinds of rare doll. One-off is the most rare, followed by artist collection and limit editions. I recalled entering lottery but never get one because of the competitiveness.

 

When I think of rare, I also think of dolls that can't be rereleased--Twigling Ingenieuse was my go-to for that, because not a lot of her exist (small edition), she was teased a while ago (2014) and isn't often sold, and she was a collaboration between Twigling and Magic Mirror, so both of them would have to agree to rerelease her, she wouldn't be simple to remake. In my time in the hobby, (since 2015) I think I've seen her for sale 3 times, one of which was a response to my feeler (thank you, by the way!!) She's the tan doll on the right!

Two absolute queens by Indifferent Red, on Flickr

The doll beside her is a really common head on a body I don't see often--Iplehouse Carina on a Mecha Angel body. Though Soom is really popular, that body doesn't seem to be, because of it's massive size (79cm). I think they were more popular when they were coming out (~2008 to 2011ish... maybe longer?). I totally impulse-bought mine cause I love tall girls, but I realized after that they don't pop up much on the market either, and they're a weird example of popular companies still having "rare" parts. I can kinda see why they're not ultra popular because no clothes fit her, and she is a class all her own in size, but soom has gone back to that size with their ID75 (garion is maybe 1-2cm shorter than her). She'll always tower over my other girls, because the tallest "female" bodies I see now are maybe 70cm

I also think of unpopular dolls. I saw some love for Fect Doll earlier in the thread (I wish I'd ordered from them when I first found them! curses!) but another sculpt I can think of that I just don't see out there would be Gem of Doll Kira (the green girl)--I only know one other person with her, and he was the whole reason I fell in love with mine.

 

Hmm, rare for me is twofold: you have older dolls from companies that no longer exist (Dream of Doll for example), or you've got ones that were limited by time or batch size (my Ringdoll Norman Dark 2.0 was limited to 30 and he has his number stamped inside his head. I know of only two other owners of the sculpt).
Then of course there are smaller artist dolls, which I suppose could be considered rare because they're very niche (Creatures Dolls, Nihilum Doll, etc.), or are still building an audience.