your wishlist then vs. your collection now - how has it changed?

I actually did get a hold of a doll I desperately wanted - she was perfect.
Too perfect. She was already painted beautifully, and I had bought her a custom made dress.
She looked like she came strait out of someone's gorgeous photographs. She was everything I thought I wanted...
but I did not feel I could customize her, so I ended up selling her almost right away.

Up until that point all dolls I had bought were damaged, second hand, from unpopular companies or frankensteined out of unusual parts. So having a perfect doll was just weird to me.

One doll has been on my wishlist from the start and it is still there. It is just a rare quirky sculpt that I never see around anymore. I still want it more than anything.

But more and more I am finding that i want to shell characters rather than just buy rescue/repair projects.
That certainly changes how I look at things.

 

The first year I was in this hobby was when my wishlist had gone through its biggest changes. I’d love to know what had all been on there as most were removed as I got a better understanding of what I did or didn’t prefer in a doll. Unfortunately I really don’t remember most of these dolls.

Once I figured it out though, it’s been mostly unchanged. The only significant change is that I no longer have any Volks boys on my list at all. There used to be a bunch but after getting one, I found that I really just don’t feel inspired by them (or younger male sculpts in general really).

At some point, in 2015 I had come on here and gutted my wishlist of any dolls where the sculpts had been discontinued or the companies had closed. It’s been pretty easy for me to recreate this list though. Sometimes I will remember a sculpt but not a name and it just takes a little digging to find it again.

 

I've been looking for a place to store my old wishlist!

iplehouse barron or ryushin, or dollmore adam dry, or elfdoll k

I know I was choosing based on appearance + price. I still have fond memories of really, really wanting Barron. As time went on and I didn't find myself in a position to order for many years, I kind of forgot about th rest of them. Barron is now retired. While I still think the adult-looking sculpts are beautiful, I am no longer sure I want such a large doll, and I have another problem. I love all of them. Almost every single company I look at their 70+ cm sculpts, there's at least one favorite in there. And that is the problem. I don't like any individual doll long enough to be willing to purchase it, or even remember the sculpt name. Maybe one day I'll find one I can actually remember specifically and not generally, but for right now, I don't have the space so it's really not a priority.

Instead, I have found that a lot more animal dolls and anthromorphic dolls (more than just animal ears slapped on) exist nowadays. I find that certain anthromorphic and animal dolls speak to me while others are silent. So I ended up with just one, the gem of doll fox Orion, and I think he's awesome. I have also acquired several Dream valley dragons, Bora, Umi, Rubin, and Bor, which I intend to paint myself (Bora is already done) as personal art projects.

 

Oh my...I still have some old Grail dolls on my wishlist, partially for nostalgia's sake (anything non-Volks) but there are still a handful of regrets that I wished I had just gone for and not let slip by. Back when I first joined DoA (2007), I was so newb and couldn't afford much back then. I wanted so many dolls from so many different companies as I was still new and wanted to get a chance to see what was out there as I was limited to what was available to me (the original physical Volks USA store in Torrance) and what was available online. Now, my current collection is more align with my top rated Grail wishlist items but not so much my lower end wishlist items.

Over time, especially after having a steady income for a while and having my boyfriend-now-husband be into the same hobby has definitely helped me build my collection but I ended up being a one company collector due to health reasons and accessibility. My husband and I, back then, had promised ourselves to only buy enough dolls to fit onto a 3 doll sized dolly couch. Bwahahahaha. Like...uh...we need to redo a room in our house to accommodate what we have now. And with our finances not as stable as before because I'm no longer working and technically disabled, it's hard to want harder to find Grail dolls on that wishlist compared to newbie me that didn't have any dolls before or employed me that could afford to.

A part of me still kind of longs for certain dolls (the Iplehouse LE ones, the discontinued Luts Baby Delf ones, some Bambicrony ones), but other ones I know that they are so old that they wouldn't fit my current aesthetic anymore and that the older BJD tech for them wouldn't have aged as well as current dollies on the market. But at this point, rounding out my Volks Grail wishlist would be an investment in itself. Hahaha.

 

I was very lucky over the years, because I could always buy my holy grail dolls over the years. Not all the same time tho
Like starting with my favorite artist, Lillycat. I get Amy from her as my first doll... on layaway. Then she finished another doll, that was totally a dream. I have had no funds to own both of them, so I sold my first doll and bought this new doll...
Over the years, I could always afford the dolls I wanted this way and the help of layaway options. Of course, this is not for everyone, because I couldn't own more than 2 dolls yet at the same time, but once you have a doll, it is easier to add an extra €100 and buy a bit more expensive one....
but I never have more than 1-2 dolls on my wishlist, so I gues I'm lucky this way)

 

My original wishlist consisted of several dolls of different brands, various sizes, and multiple genders. After being in the hobby for a while I realize I really just want 4 total dolls with several interchangeable heads and extensive wardrobes. And I like for them to be from the same brand and same size so that they can share clothing and photograph similarly. I want them to be so similar that I actually want variations of the same mold, the four sisters by Volks! As of now I technically own all four dolls (one is still en route from FCS) and my wishlist is completed besides a total of four extra heads for different looks!

A bonus! For fun I think it'd be cute for each of my dolls to have their own doll in the form of a Four Sister YOSD as a prop. It's only an idea and nothing I'm actively working towards but consider that the "Pipedream Wishlist", lol!