Mariel

I'm pretty sad to be at the end of my Ariel experiment.  I've learned to love this face even more than I used to, and I've really enjoyed finding subtle new ways to paint the mold.  In fact, I know the contours of this face so well at this point, it's going to feel really strange to work with a different doll next week!  In a perfect world I'd do this kind of series for every My Twinn face.  That would be so much fun!

The Ariel variation that I saved for last is the one that I assumed would be my favorite.  Three guesses about what her coloring is going to be...the first two guesses don't count.

This lovely girl's original pale green eyes didn't stick around for very long, but they gave me all the inspiration I needed to get started on this makeover:

2002 My Twinn doll with the Ariel face.

I named this doll Mariel.  It's my favorite of the -iel names.  The name means "of the sea," and, according to one interpretation, Mariel is also the archangel of memory...which is something I could use most days.

Here's a head shot of Mariel that shows her full original wig:

In retrospect, the fullness of that wig carries a bit of foreshadowing for Mariel's final look!

The wig was matted and frizzy, but it wasn't thinning, which means that I was able to set it aside for future resurrection.

The rest of Mariel's 2002 body was in pretty rough shape:

She has a ton of picks in her cloth torso and some mild squeaking in her armature:

Her back looks ok from a distance...

...but she has significant snagging in the fabric here, too:

And she also had some bad stains on her vinyl arms:

Her legs were in better shape than her arms, with only some dirt and minor scuffs:

Mariel's face had a small scuff on the nose, missing eyelashes, faded/discolored eyes, and a lot of dirt:

I brought Mariel into my workshop so that I could take her head off and get started on the makeover.

When I peeled away the cloth body slip, I noticed that the glue attaching the head to the body had oozed out and into the foam around the neck.  This meant that, over the years, every time the head was moved, the foam around the joint ripped and pulled away from the body, leaving a dent in the foam just under the neck:

I chiseled away the foam that had stuck to the bottom of the neck, and then I was able to remove the head and get to work.

Here's the head without the old wig:

Mariel's eye sockets were incredibly dirty, and her green irises had faded and were rimmed with blue-tinted scleras.  The left eye also had a small crack at one edge:

I really love the sage green color of these eyes, though.  They're a similar color to Sariel's glass eyes.

I removed Mariel's old eyelashes:

And then I gave her whole head a thorough cleaning and stripped away her factory paint:

I've been wanting to try Eyeco's Ultra (silicone) "Afghan Green" eyes for a long time.  They look really gorgeous in photographs and are equally beautiful in real life.  I thought that they would be the perfect match for Mariel.

The detail in these eyes is wonderful:

I thought that the amber circlet on the inside of these irises would go really well with red hair!

As I got ready to paint Mariel's face, I found a few photos of red-haired girls online and printed them out for inspiration.  This one, which I used as an eyebrow guide, is my favorite:

I outlined the eyebrows faintly with watercolor pencil:

And then I filled in the shape with very bright red:

I was reluctant to paint the eyebrows this bright, but I noticed from my reference photograph that eyebrow color can match the color of the hair almost exactly....and this is pretty close to the color of the wig that I had picked out for Mariel.

I also noticed that the model in my photo has some blonde hairs in her eyebrows, so I added some lighter hairs to Mariel's brows:

Here's a closer look:

I did a fairly generic painting of the lips, with a wide, fully-painted upper lip and just a slight reduction in the thickness of the lower lip:

The heads always look so strange at this stage!  The combination of bright brows, bright lips, and no color in the cheeks is very startling.

I was eager to put some blush on Mariel and make her look a bit more human:

I've been wanting to do a heavily-freckled doll for a while now, and thought that Mariel presented a good opportunity.  

Not only do freckles go well with red hair, but they're a good way to make Mariel distinct from the other five Ariel dolls.

So...I painted a lot of freckles!

Yowzer!

I'm sure that these freckles will be too much for many people, but I can never get enough of them!

While I was working on Mariel's head, her arms were being treated with Remove-Zit.  The stains looked really bad, but they must have been fairly shallow, because it only took a week or so for them to fade away:

Once the vinyl had recovered for a few more weeks, I painted some blushing and freckles on the arms, too!

As I was getting ready to put Mariel's head back onto her body, I noticed a dark pink spot on the back of her left leg that I hadn't seen before.  After several treatments with Remove-Zit, this spot faded as well:

See if you can find it!

In order to fix the dent in the foam that I showed you earlier...

...I cut a piece of foam from another body (one that I use for parts):

And I glued the extra foam into the dent:

I glued Mariel's head back onto her body and re-stitched the back seam, but I had one more little project to do before I was ready to finish her.

I wanted to use the bright red Poppy wig from ZaZou Custom Dolls for Mariel. I used this wig on Elsie, and the color is absolutely gorgeous:

Now that's a redhead.

The only problem with this wig is that it's the exact same length and style as the wigs I used for Sariel and Liriel.  It's also very similar to the Monique wig I used for Gabriel.  I'm a little tired of long, wavy wigs, and of course I'm trying to make all of these dolls look as different as possible.

So, I tried a little experiment!  I boiled-washed a Poppy wig so that it was poker-straight--just like I did with Liriel's wig.  Then, I cut off about 5 inches of the length.  Ack!  That was stressful.

Next, I used these awesome corkscrew curlers to curl the shorter hair:

The curlers are really easy to use, and they come in two different colors so that you can be sure to put the same number of curls on each side of the head.  Once all of the curlers were in place, I dipped the whole wig in boiling water again--to set the curls more securely.

Given what happened with Rani's attempted wig rescue, I was a little nervous about pulling out these curlers to see what had happened to the hair!

However, the first curl I tested looked great:

It was a success!  I had no tangling as I removed the curlers, and the new curls are tight and resilient.

I put the newly-curled wig on Mariel's head and gave her some auburn eyelashes to match:

All I had left to do was close up the neck seam and Mariel was ready for her outfit!

I had been envisioning Mariel with an emerald green sash and a green birthstone necklace--to match the green of her eyes--but there were a few problems with this.

First of all, the "emerald" crystal charm that I got for the necklace was way too blue and didn't match any of the green ribbons I'd chosen. The other green charm, an imitation peridot, was way too light:

None of these green colors matched Mariel's eyes, either.  The Afghan Green eyes are nowhere near as green as I thought they would be.

So, I gave Mariel a burgundy sash (which goes nicely with her hair) and ordered a new charm to match that color.

Here she is:

The wig is crazy.  The curls go in every direction, but they're silky-soft and so fun to play with!

I tried not to manipulate the curls too much at first, just using my fingers to get them semi-organized.

As I was photographing Mariel, I started to notice that the light was catching part of her left eye in a funny way.  Maybe you can see it here:

I drew a white arrow to show you the area I'm talking about:

I assumed that this was just some residual glue from the eyelash application, so I took Mariel back into my workroom to clean it up.

However, I discovered that there was actually a defect in the left eye:

The iris decal is creased, causing several pale lines across the lower part of the eye:

When I go back and look at my earlier pictures, I can see that this defect was visible all along--I just didn't noice it.

How hugely depressing.

This has actually happened to me once or twice before.  The silicone eyes are so beautiful and easy to use, but they don't fit perfectly into some of the dolls' eye sockets.  The tight fit puts tension on parts of the eye, causing it to bend strangely.

When I pulled the eyes out and relieved the pressure on the silicone, the iris went back to looking completely normal.  Unfortunately, the brutal process of extracting the eyes ruined them in other ways.  That's $40 down the drain.  Gulp.

I think I'll stick to glass and acrylic eyes from now on!

I replaced Mariel's eyes with my very favorite acrylic eyes, Eyeco's A251:

The great thing about these eyes is that they're wonderfully green!

I had to remove the wig when I was dealing with the eyes, and it got a little messy in the process.  Finger-combing was no longer enough to make it look nice.  I was hesitant to use a brush on the curls, but I decided to go for it and see what happened.  

The curls loosened a little after a thorough brushing, and some of the distinct ringlets disappeared, but I think the hair still looks good:

The curl in this wig reminds me of the Monique Donna wig, except that the fibers in this wig are so much nicer.

I had some lovely green ribbon that matched Mariel's new eyes nicely, but the ribbon was too thin.  So, I ordered a thicker ribbon in the same color and a new green birthstone charm to match.

I didn't want to wait for those items to arrive before I started taking pictures, so I cobbled together a thick ribbon from glued sections of the thin ribbon, and I strung a green bead (left over from Layla's hair) onto Mariel's necklace chain:

That'll do for now!

It's hard to capture Mariel's arm freckles in most of these pictures, but the sleeves on this dress show them off nicely:

I might have gone a tad overboard with the blushing on the arms.

I usually start these photo sessions by showing dolls with their hair down, but Mariel's curls are really best when they're clipped back away from her face:

As sad as I am about losing the fancy Eyeco Ultra eyes, I'm really happy with these new ones.  They are so bright and green, and they work perfectly with Mariel's hair.  She's got a bit of Irish in her, this one!

I wasn't sure whether to do Mariel's official portrait with her hair clipped back...

...or with it falling freely around her face:

I opted for the clipped-back style, just so we could get the best view of her whole face:

Here's the comparison GIF:

With the portrait out of the way, I let Mariel take her hair down and have some fun:

I love posing Mariel with this wig!

It's definitely full of volume!

I think Mariel also looks nice with her hair clipped back low on her head, like this:

The curls make even a simple ribbon-tied ponytail style look nice!

The shorter hair works well with the angel wings, too:

Here's Mariel with all of her angel accessories:

This is one of my favorite pictures of her:

Before I show you how Mariel looks outside in the sunshine, let's take a look at the final cumulative GIF for this project!'

I set out to make six Ariel-faced dolls that look as different as possible.  Let's see how I did:

Boy, Cassiel sure seemed like a redhead until we met Mariel, didn't she?!  That stands out to me right away.

A few of them strike me as being less like a conventional Ariel than the others.  I'm not sure I can pick a favorite, though!  I guess Sariel still seems special to me, and of course I love Mariel's freckles and red hair.  But it's also fun to go back and see the expressions I chose for the earlier dolls.  I think I've even grown to like Liriel's ethereal beauty.

I'd love to know which girl you like best, and which one is the most surprising for an Ariel-faced doll!

After I'd finished taking all of Mariel's pictures, her new sash ribbon and birthstone charm arrived in the mail.  Here's what they look like--with the two older charms for comparison:

I love the new color and am always amazed when things that I've tried to match by looking at online pictures actually match!  Yay!  The new birthstone charm is meant to be peridot--the birthstone of August.

Mariel will be wearing her new accessories in the group shots that I'll post in a few days.

For now, though, let's go back in time to when I brought Mariel outside with her makeshift belt and necklace:

The freckles are a bit easier to see in the natural light, I think:

And her hair and eyes look great against the green forest backdrop!

I like this shot of Mariel with the direct sunlight igniting part of her hair:

But I think a bit of shade is more flattering to her overall:

Mariel heard that Sari had found some plants in the backyard that matched the green in her eyes, so she searched all over for something that would match her own coloring.

She found this sage green moss that was pretty cool:

But it's a bit too light to match her eyes.

She ended up finding several bright green leaves that match her eyes really well, and even one early-turning leaf that almost matches her hair!

She was happiest, though, when she found a patch of clover.  She wanted to me to arrange it in her hair, like Cassiel's yellow flowers...

...but she was worried that it might look a little silly.

I told her it was an excellent way to honor her Irish roots!

I loved working with this doll.  There were a few hiccups in her makeover, sure, but overall everything turned out for the best.  Her shorter, curly hair is a bit unruly, but I adore it.  I'm excited to try this new curling technique with some other wigs.  Mariel's level of freckling might be too extreme for some collectors, but freckles and red hair are my passion, and I really enjoyed being able to practice this type of painting.  Frankly, I was tempted to keep this sweetie in my own collection (she fits in perfectly around here!), but with our big move coming up, that's impractical.  I'll have to settle for a promise to make another one like her some day.

Here's a summary of all the work that was done on Mariel:

-the neck seam was opened and glue residue was stripped away from the neck and from nearby foam

-the old wig and eyelashes were removed

-the head was separated from the body and all vinyl parts were washed

-the forearms and a spot on the leg were treated with Remove-Zit and then cleaned with Formula 9-1-1

-the head was scrubbed with Mr Clean Magic Eraser and all factory paint was stripped away

-the old eyes were removed

-she was given new Eyeco eyes

-her head was sealed with Mr. Super Clear

-her face was repainted, including eyebrows, lips, blush and lots of freckles!

-her forearms were blushed and freckled

-she was given new eyelashes

-a Poppy wig from ZaZou Custom Dolls was straightened, cut, re-curled, and glued on at the front and the back with hot glue

-a defect in one eye was discovered, and so the wig and eyelashes were removed, new Eyeco A251  acrylic eyes were placed, and the wig and eyelashes we re-applied

-she is wearing a white peasant-style dress from Doll Clothes by Carole.  The dress will be paired with a green "peridot" birthstone charm and a matching satin sash.  She will also come with detachable angel wings and a fairy light halo

Mariel's biggest flaws are that she has significant snagging on her fabric torso and some mild squeaking in her armature.  She has a few shiny spots and small scuffs from being old.

Mariel has sold.  Thank you!