Your reasons for choosing your first doll?

I wanted a large enough doll for a price that wouldn't make my fiance fall over - we're careful with our money, especially as we're trying to move house, and I plan on getting more so I needed to ease him into the hobby slowly XD So I went for an Island Crystal sculpt, I loved her pretty face and her elven ears, and she was relatively affordable even with wig and faceup

 

Well, being a student who only earns money for dolls during school breaks... I would say: price, sculpt and reviews. I go for dolls from a certain price point (although I know it's not encouraged, but I feel that there are gorgeous dolls that aren't as expensive as well!) and then I choose the sculpt with features that I love and check up on reviews from the company and photos from other doll owners! It really takes a lot of time for me to decide as well hahah!

 

I believe it was a Switch Javi. This was so long ago, the company wasn't even named Switch at the time. So Nyeon Gi, I think it was?

...and it was kind of a poor decision, honestly. I loved the company's photos, but never warmed to the doll itself once I received. I sold it fairly quickly.

It is always hard to judge dolls' sculpts from just photos, but I think it is especially difficult when you are new to the hobby to differentiate between your love for the faceup, styling and photography versus your love for the actual blank sculpt which is what you are getting.

To be fair though, I might have liked that doll better had I received it today because I have better faceup skills now and might be able to make it look the way I really wanted it to look. And also, I think part of my frustration was not due to the doll but to the usual hurdles of the bjd hobby - I didn't know how to do this or that, everything was expensive, everything took a long time to arrive, stuff didn't fit, and so on.

 

My mom and I found this hobby on Pinterest, and we found the dolls we were pinning the most were Iplehouse dolls. So when I finally decided to get one and talked my husband into it, I knew it would be an Iplehouse. After that it was just looking at all the sculpts and deciding what I liked the best.

 

I was looking around at bjds on ebay. I had just gotten info about the hobby from someone on DA, so naturally, my impatience kicked in and I had to have one soon! I found this girl on ebay, who just struck me. I quickly made an offer, not knowing hardly anything about the sculpt. After some haggling, we agreed on a price and I had won! She was a full doll with a wig, COA, original box, etc.

 

I was into Anime figures, when I suddenly discovered BJD dolls. their beautiful faces facinated me, and I sat for days and nights researhing and looked at pictures of hundreds of dolls. I finally decided to order a FeePle65 Chloe from Fairyland. When it arrived I was about burned out, after too much BJD stuff in just a few weeks time, so the doll was stored away. Then the fire came back to me a few months later, with full ignition, and I started to look for outfits. I got my outfit and dressed her up for display. After that I have bought more dolls, but i have also discovered Volks Dollfie Dreams and Smart Dolls, which I love with same passion as the BJD's. So now I have dolls in all three categories. And I am so happy with all those adorable faces surrounding me everywhere in my home

 

I wanted my first doll to have a feminine face with big expressive eyes. Also, the look of the body was very important. I was looking for a thin and again very feminine sculpt. I ended up ordering Kiomi.

 

Before I got into BJDs, I collected Pullips. Browsing for Pullip clothes is actually how I came across clothes for Lati's. I was instantly drawn to how detailed and delicate they were, and a plus was that they're so small! I absolutely adore all things tiny, so of course my first BJD was a little Lati White

 

When I first saw Kai on my local trade site, just had to have him, even though he was rather expensive, lucky me the seller let me pay him off, so 6 months later, he was mine I suspect that my reason was he was really mature and that's what I was looking for.

 

I wanted a 1/3 doll and the only place I knew to look for one was at a convention. I only found only one boy that size. He was wearing a wig that was too large and awful oversized, mismatched clothes. But I kept thinking about his beautiful face and finally decided to buy him. I have no regrets. With a properly fitted wig and the historical clothes he loves, he's magnificent.

 

I fell in love with a company when I was 13 or 14-- mind, this is over 14 or 15 years ago. I recently became very certain that this company with my dream dolls was Luts, and now I'm not even sure if that's true! But I absolutely needed to have a doll from this company, and if it's Luts, that means I must have a Luts doll! And the most appealing of those dolls was Jun Ha, so that's what I picked.

After a lot of waiting, and anxiety, and general not doing well, he came home-- and my reception was honestly pretty lukewarm, like, I wasn't absolutely thrilled like I thought I'd be. But these days, looking at him, my heart skips a little, and nothing makes me happier than to hold him and touch him. Even if Luts wasn't my dream company, I'm pretty sure I have my dream doll after all.

 

My deciding factors were the following:

1. Doll's face must not be too anime-looking
2. Doll's body must be close to realistic proportions
3. Doll must be within my set budget

I browsed through tons of images from various BJD companies before I decided on a doll whose face/body type I liked and was actually in my spending limits (Iplehouse met #1 and #2 but way overshot #3). Now I'm just setting things in order so I can finally order her.

 

My first doll is my Fantasy Doll Tobias, I got him in 2011.
I wasn't sure at the time if it was a hobby that I could commit to financially. But I really wanted a doll because I saw so many of them at a convention the year before. So I did some research and some searching and I found Fdoll. They had the SD13 sizes that I want, and for a price I could afford and was willing to pay to see if it was something for me.
I got him two months after I ordered him and I haven't looked back since. :P
He's still my favorite doll and of all the ones that I have gotten since then, he's the one I'm most proud of and the one I have invested more time and effort in to. ^__^

 

So embarrassing
I bought the cheapest one I could find and based it on the profile pic because I liked the color of the eyes...
Not knowing eyes were interchangable.

 

ooohhh I see your picture there... is that a pullip dal doll??? are you also a collector?

the Reason is "I love the sculpt" i love girl dolls and the size if perfect... not too tall not too short... just right

 

'Realistic' is the only condition for choosing my first bjd because I wish she could exbit my designs of cloth emulatly

 

My first dolly will be Ringdolls Lucifer, for several reasons.

He looks the most like my character - humourisly also called Lucifer - and his face is just all puurdy.
His default hair was also super close to Lucys.
He's purrdy.
So purrdy.
Oh my god i cannot stop looking at him.
Where did i come from.. Oh! And even thought he's insanely expensive for a first doll? I couldn't find anyone else who looked as much like him as Lucifer does. It was faaaaate!

 

I knew I wanted a more mature type body (so that meant msd or sd). But I generally just looked at sculpts and other peoples collections too. When I found LIttle Sophia, I checked reviews and unboxing's, and other collectors Little Sophia's to get a feel what could do with her. I also just found her super pretty, and couldn't stop obsessing.

 

I chose my first doll by asking myself, how much am i willing to spend. At first i really couldnt believe the prices and told myself, nah ill never be able to get one no matter how much i like these gorgeous dolls. I passed on the idea for 4yrs. Then i just couldnt hold much longer and i said, the only one that i am willing to spend that much is Sephiroth. Then i looked, researched and found one. At first he was soldout then i asked the company if they are willing to sell them again soon. So there ^_^ im happy i did.

 

Frankly, she was cheap and cute. I did not need anything else at that time.