By JAN LARSON McLAUGHLIN
BG Independent News
For more than 60 years, Barbie has been the go-to girl for generations. The release of the “Barbie” movie has reignited interest in the doll, her dream houses, and her dazzling pinkness.
Barbie has changed over the decades – as evidenced by her careers, her cars and her clothing. But she still elicits the same strong feelings from many women who grew up with multiple Barbie dolls, stunning accessories and plastic carrying cases which made it easy to transport their collections.
“It stimulates such feelings,” said Wood County Museum Curator Holly Hartlerode Kirkendall. “It’s a real connection between ages.”
And as such, the museum has a collection of Barbie items, though Kirkendall is quick to note that she is strictly an amateur when it comes to the Mattel wonder doll.
“I’m not an expert on Barbie,” she said. But she has seen the movie, she grew up playing with the dolls, and her daughters are captivated by the dolls and dream house now.
Kirkendall recalled the Barbie house was high on the list for girls when she was a child.
“I wanted the dream house, but I got the townhouse,” she lamented with a smile. “I told my mom that the townhouse must have been on sale.”
The collection at the museum includes one of the original homes for Barbie, a cardboard fold-out house with a studio layout. The 1962 house had a few accessories, like miniature record albums mirroring album covers of that era.
That compares to today’s dream house, a three-story, palatial residence complete with a pool that can hold water, a three-story water slide, elevator that can hold a Barbie in a wheelchair, plus light and sound features. Kirkendall borrowed her daughters’ modern dream house to bring to the museum for comparison with its bland predecessor.
“My little one was all distraught. I told her I’d bring it home tomorrow,” Kirkendall said.
Barbie had clearly upsized and updated her furnishings over the decades. Modern dream houses include 75 accessory pieces. Items for children to arrange, and for parents to frantically search for when they get lost.
There’s a desk lamp, inflatable beverage holders for the pool, a puppy complete with dog bone and bed and bowl, a plastic palm tree, vase with flowers, muffins in the oven, plastic pizza and bowl of popcorn, toothbrushes, pots and pans, and sunglasses.
Lest any parents worry about Barbie’s lifestyle, all the beds in her home are still single beds.
The evolution of Barbie abodes has been written about in many publications, including the New York Times, House & Garden, Architectural Digest, Business Insider, HGTV and by countless toy collectors.
Some of the fancier mansions along the way were full of glam, with a clawfoot bathtub, stained glass windows, a dreamy turret, and a spiral staircase with a mechanism to move a doll up the stairs.
The newer homes are electrified, have hot tubs, barbecue grills for outdoor parties, and recycling bins for cleaning up afterward.
Then came a home with a rooftop balcony boasting a telescope for stargazing. Some houses doubled up on elevators, having one specifically for Barbie’s accessories so she could choose her outfit and send it to the bathroom to change into after her shower.
Later houses had a garage for Barbie’s car, plus a TV with a flip-down feature made so people could play their own videos by inserting their smartphone. While many of the previous houses have had light and sound features, more modern houses had voice-controlled features for the elevator, the front door and a staircase that turns into a slide.
Even though Barbie’s male counterpart, Ken, was introduced a year before the dream house in 1962, the houses have always belonged to Barbie.
The Wood County Museum has some of the earlier dolls.
“This is the oldest Barbie we have,” Kirkendall said, holding up Midge, one of Barbie’s friends from 1960. There’s Francine – Barbie’s “modern cousin,” Rapunzel Barbie, Rainbow Ken and regular Ken with his tuxedo complete with a boutonniere on his lapel, and beach duds consisting of very short red swim trunks.
“Nobody really played with Ken,” Kirkendall said. Her daughters were less than enthralled by the Ken character. “They named their Ken dolls ‘Travis’ after their father.”
The museum also has one of Barbie’s Corvettes, carrying cases with photos of heartthrobs from the era, and storage drawers full of well-worn dolls, clothes and accessories like hot pink boots, hats, purses, a camera and briefcase.
Kirkendall pointed out that Barbie had progressed, evidenced by one of her daughter’s latest Barbie birthday gifts being an ambulance, staffed by two Barbie doctors, a nurse and veterinarian.
After all, Barbie has a mortgage to pay – and dream houses don’t come cheap.
