Character dolls. Don't you just love them?

 A day to go to Kirkstall Abbey to photograph these lovely Panre Spanish character dolls.

My first Panre doll was found in a junk shop in Yeadon. I picked her up as she had a price tag of about one pound or something like that.....I thought " scary doll!!" . when I got to the till the lady obviously thought the same and reduced the price to 75p as she did not think anyone else would like her....so there I was caring this doll home. She was in good condition except the hair was wild!!!

I had no idea at all what I was getting into here. The original doll had no markings and no clues. So I posted her on a rescue doll site on facebook and just said "help". One of the replys surjested she was a Spanish character doll from the 1990s.

So I looked them up and now I have another that I just found in Otley.

I have now cleaned her up, given her a bath and washed her hair three times as it has a waxy residue which was really hard to get off. The more hot water and washing up liquid I used the worse it got. I resorted to washing powder and stain remover and left her soaking over night.

She has a vinyl head with fabric body...the body and white parts of her dress were very badly rust stained. I can not get this out completely, but it is faded a very lot.

I eventually sorted out the hair, though I did have to cut a bit off as it was damaged and ratty....it is still quite long even so.

We went to Kirkstall Abbey to take these photos after much debate....and arrived just a head of a party of school kids on a history lesson. Lee took me firmly by the hand a walked quickly through the museum to the ruins....whilst I was taking these pictures the whole party were watching me....through the iron gate to the cloisters!


This is the label from the girl with the blue dress.....

Found like this she was.

I got the next bit from the website.......

Everything began three decades ago in Onil, current location of the company, a city in southeastern Spain and very close to Castalla (Alicante). It was there, where a family of toymakers launched their great dream, to make dreams come true in the shape of dolls. José Antonio Arias’ fabulous idea is kept alive, thanks to the tenacity of his children to perpetuate something that is more than a profession, a tradition.

This fantasy world has been continuously growing, until it has created a whole world of our own brand toys or manufactured them for specialty shops.

And like all dreams, this one doesn’t know boundaries, aiming to reach all corners of the world.

This label was on the doll in the Blue velvet dress that I rescued from a junk shop in Otley.

MUÑECAS ARIAS has spent years devoted to making dolls that inspire children, as they know how important this type of toy plays in their emotional development. We know that a doll is more than a simple toy, it helps encourage such noble emotions as affection, language, responsibility, order and above all, the imagination. For this, we like to say that we are not toy manufacturers, we are a dream factory.


This doll has ref 2016 on the back of the label. I have looked this up on Google bit no luck. But this is possibly because I am looking in the wrong place,
 This doll I found in a junk shop in Otley. We had been for lunch at Wetherspoons with American Friends who were staying near in an old farm cottage on a working farm. They wanted some good old Yorkshire character, and they surely got a lot. So after lunch I took them on a quick tour of my favourite junk shops.......

We were shown up into a stock room on the third floor of a Georgian creaking house, rammed full of boxes of junk. The dolls we were shown were junk too, though the seller was convinced otherwise and wanted them bought and shipped to America.

I spotted the little Spanish doll, all ratted out and covered in muck and rust marks. I knew exactly what she was. I bought her even though I did not think that I could restore her completely.

This is as good as I could manage after much washing and soaking. She still has slightly rust stained eyes....but never mind. ! I love her now.


                 

And this lovely lady I just bought from Ebay. There are others out there....but I have just had my credit card deftly and painlessly surgically removed by one slick wrist movement from Lee. He has hidden it and I am not allowed to buy any more.

We will see about that! And here are some more I found around the Net.........