New hair - new image - new life

My friend Olga is a great doll player. She is a very serious and respectful lady, a doctor, and her apartment in St-Petersburg is full of beautiful dolls. Momoko, Tonner, collectible Barbies, special editions of different brands...

From her I learned a lot about dolls and how to play with them.  Enchanted by amazing doll world ladies spend time not only sewing new outfits and making photos of their dolls in graceful poses, they even reroot their hair, change their make up and tone of the body.

Thanks to her my two small helpers came to me. They are Tonner girls, 16" height, which is a little bit smaller than 1/4 human body. Particularly 1/4 was important for me because when I studied dressmaking and clothes constructing I was taught to make and to use test constructions 1/4 original size. So my dolls work as a small mannequins and exquisitely beautiful models for me. I even made a 'human' pattern for them. It is a great pleasure to dress them up.


When Masha's doll we brought from Russia came to such pitiful condition, I thought about rerooting her hair. It is very nice doll with a teen body and anime-like face and I really wanted to give her a longer life. I have never done this before, it was my first experience, and I must say it is a very long journey!











The only hair I could find was in Spotlight. They have curls of five colours: white, yellow, red, brown and black. I chose brown as it was close to the doll's original hair.




1. I took off her original hair. I had to put off her head and to make a cut in the top of her head, which I sealed afterwards. I used pincers, long needle, my small jewellery pliers, and a hook made of white thread helped me as a needle threader for the hair line.






2. New hair was a one long line of a few hair threads. One can put it into a needle and sew through the holes in the doll's head down and up lots of times, and cut the thread on the demanded length.

3. It was impossible to predict what  length would be good, especially with curls, so it was better to leave them longer and finish the haircut later. Or leave it to Masha, she is happy to do the haircuts.

4. It was very difficult to find the holes from inside the head with the needle, so most of the times I made a new hole. Which was good to fix the hair better.

5. Here we go! I was not sure if one pack of hair would be enough,  but finally I have hair left for at least one more doll.  

To be honest this is my favourite hair ever. I have been dreaming to have such hair myself for all my life. But mine is as straight as rain.

If you wish to reroot old doll's hair, don't be afraid! But keep your patience, it is pretty long and meditative work.