Seeing other collectors out in the wild?

Back when Teavana tea shops used to be in malls and I used to go to malls, I walked by and spotted someone with one of those Dollmore carrier bags. I instantly recognized it because I had been considering buying one.

I sheepishly approached and asked if there was a doll in there by chance (I used the generic word doll instead of BJD just in case I was wrong). To my surprise, she said yes. Then I led into "is it ball-jointed?" Yes! Cue the hobby dumping moment.

My 2nd encounter was at an old job. I used to work at a library. I discovered my supervisor there had a casual interest and owned a few dolls. I can't remember what lead up to the conversation but I remember generically alluding to "a hobby I have where I paint dolls" at some point and she asked if it was BJD

I always love a good dollspotting moment and hope to have more some day

 

I would Love to run into a fellow bjd owner, sadly thats unlikely

 

Up until now, I've been lucky in the number of doll friends who live close enough that (in pre-covid times) we saw each other quite a bit), but now th three I see most often are moving to other areas, and other parts of the country, so getting together for dolly days (or gaming) probably won't be as easy.

The doll has a red wig and is dressed in tartan to represent a Nac Mac Feegle, but the owner, (understandably) wasn't prepared to cover the doll in so many tatoos that the skin looked blue. I went the other way and sacrificed a white skinned Banji (I never took to whiteskin dolls, this was an early addition to the family) and dyed her blue to give the impression of Feegledom:

I know they have them in the US but don't know the details - the ones in the UK are every othr year. I can often be found running the Chaos Costume workshop at them (supervised by a few dolls, of course) along with my non-doll friend, Barbara.

It is? That must be recent as I got a message just the other day. I'll look into it.

I'll bet there are other BJD folk in your area - you just haven't encountered them yet.

Teddy

 

A few years ago someone got onto the bus I was on and had what appeared to be a Dollfie Dream. I ran into them again a few weeks later on the same bus route. I never did talk to them for various reasons.

 

No, but my fiancé did while working at a hotel. Idk if he struck up conversation with the guest or not, but he came home and told me about it, all excited.

 

before i was actually in the hobby (i had briefly looked into bjd and generally knew what was up but i didn't have one of my own) i met a collector while i was working at jo-ann fabrics. they were purchasing a variety of acrylic paints, and part of the required questions to ask at the register was 'what are you making?' which i enjoyed doing because you could learn about everyone's projects. when i asked them, they told me they were getting the paint to do makeup on doll faces, and asked me if i had ever heard of ball jointed dolls. i said yes, and told them i didn't have one because i didn't know where to start. they gave me lots of tips on where to look, and even recommended this forum as a good starting point! i wish i had more time to chat with this person, but unfortunately there was a line and i had to keep doing my job.

but in the unlikely event that person remembers and sees this, thanks for chatting with me, it really helped me get into the hobby, even though it was still a few years after our conversation that i got my first bjd!

 

Uhhh, I'm likely to be the person other people see in the wild since I'm very much out and about doing urban photography. Lots of laypeople approach me while I'm doing photo shoots (and I see a lot of models/actors/artists in the wild because we all have the same ideas about what looks good) and they're 90% respectful and curious. I'd love to meet another actual collector though but the city is too big for a chance encounter like that.

 

@Teddy I am going to have to look them up! Sometimes I get envious over the UK conventions - or just Europe - because I could have so many more Hobbit/LotR autographs.

I have had people say they understand me taking photos in gardens/parks because their family member is a photographer. I don't think they ever said their family members had BJDs but at least no one reacts in disgust. But I am also horribly afraid of dog walkers or trail bike riders so I try to be fast so I am out of the way.

 

Can't comment on that as I don't do Tolkien fandom. I've entered costume competitions with friends who are in the Tolkein Society but they despair of my attitude toward both the books and the films (the books badly need editing down to make them shorter - fourteen pages of meticulously described uneventful travel removed here and there could winnow LOTR down to one pretty decent book, then there would only be the need for one film AND it could be much shorter).

I do tend to go out-an-about a lot with my BJD (and off-topic dolls) but I've done that forever - as evidenced by TV footage from a documentary about The World Science Fiction Convention back in 1987 which shows me striding along in a red velvet cloak with my teddybear (dressed as a dragon) on my shoulders, with his wings flapping as I walk, and holiday photo's with rag dolls in them.

Teddy

 

Back when I got my first doll (so late 2007), I would totally bring her out and about. It was in the early days of BJD collecting so in my newbie way I was trying to see if there were any fellow BJD owners out there too. I had a decent range in California so I would usually see them out in the wild in like Little Tokyo or other similar areas where there was a high concentration of Japanese-Americans or fellow anime/manga lovers. These were mostly in LA and Orange County in open air malls, places that served afternoon tea, or spots like Disneyland where there are a lot of photo opportunities. I spotted Pullips more often than not then DDs, but I once randomly walked into an anime/manga store and it had in glass cases Neon Genesis Evangelion Rei and Asuka BJDs (most likely Volks). I think in general for most of the Asian/Pacific Islander areas that I went to (Japanese, Vietnamese, Filipino, Korean, etc), upon seeing my BJD most people would be like, "Oh, that's a pretty porcelain doll" and maybe would ask how much for themselves or their daughters and possibly to hold it to see how what it's like. It got easier when my best friend got her own BJD as well as my husband (safety in numbers) so it felt less of an oddity and more actual BJD owners would pop up (again, maybe feeling less shy since there's more of us with dolls). Other than that, mainly at AnimeExpo and the Volks Dolls Party in Los Angeles/Anaheim.

But I have to admit, since Covid I've been less inclined to bring my dolls out with us. Partly because of the whole sanitizing process that we've adopted once we return home after an outing (I had emergency surgery recently and other chronic health problems before Covid while my husband has weakened lungs due to asthma and bronchitis nearly every year of his life), so I kind of don't want to expose my dollies to whatever is out there. Although...might be tempted to get a travel/sacrificial dolly from the Marketplace that I don't mind exposing to the world. Hahahaha.

 

I saw a tiktok and one of the people on the tiktok was wearing a white outfit while holding a BJD with white outfit as well. It was not in real life but it still surprised me to see a bjd in a non bjd related video.

 

One time I was walking out of a Jo-Ann's, and I saw a girl with a doll walking in. I'm pretty sure it was a BJD, but not entirely. I just stared at her as I was walking because I was too shy to say anything.

 

Outside of other people at doll meets or doll-related gatherings at nerdier cons... I don't think I ever have.

Which is a little odd, now that I think about it, given how often I've hauled one doll or another out into the wilds. You'd think I would have run into somebody somewhere who knew... But no. Issun, my Banji, travels with me (The little guy has literally gone halfway around the world now. ) but even the people who have paused and asked about him when I pulled him out to play photography-model-in-interesting-places never had a clue what kind of little doll he was.

 

Back in 2007 I went to Anime Expo with my CP El on my shoulder. While in line to get badges another girl spotted him and we had a convo about bjds. She was actually a member here too, can't remember her name, though.

Then, in 2015 or 16, I went to Costume College and in the room where the contest costumes were, were a few BJDs. There wasn't anyone with them, but I was sure to snap a pic because I'd never seen any bjds outside of doll places, meets, or anime cons