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Summary: Great Barbie Resource
Review: This book is a wonderful overview of the early Barbie years. It really puts Barbie in context with the time she was created and demonstrates how she reflected society and the styles of that era. It's full of helpful information in identifying the various dolls and the photography is both breathtaking and a lot of fun!
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Summary: Unique and Fresh Pespective. The text is provocative.
Review: This book is offers the opportunity to help a collector realize the direction of their collecting. It also offers the non collector the opportunity to understand what motivates a collector. There are so many reasons to collect, reminders of the past and desires for the future. This book helps to put it all in perspective. If people used this book to guide their collecting, we'd all be much more selective.
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Summary: A reader from Portland, Oregon and Barbie expert for 10 yrs
Review: This book is one of the most beautiful Barbie books ever written. The pictures are beautiful. The dolls represent pictures of many of the best barbie collections in the World. The information is quite extensive. I give it a 11! Simply the best!
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Summary: A reader from Portland, Oregon and Barbie expert for 10 yrs
Review: This book is one of the most beautiful Barbie books ever written. The pictures are beautiful. The dolls represent pictures of many of the best barbie collections in the World. The information is quite extensive. I give it a 11! Simply the best!
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Summary: So detail oriented~
Review: This book is PERFECT for the advanced collector. Going thru each style of BARBIE from Ponytails thru TNT's. If you are looking for price guides, this is not the book for you. If you are wondering what the difference between white ginger and platinum bubbles, or what year TNT's had centered eyes, or to just drool over totally mint rare dolls, THIS IS FOR YOU! I really like it.
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Summary: Excellent Close Up Photos - Great for Restoration Samples!
Review: This book is really a "fluff" version of the Barbie collector books. It doesn't have price guides, it doesn't list all the markings for the correct bodies, etc. However, what it does have is gorgeous up-close photos of mint vintage dolls. Whenever I'm having a doll restored, this is the book I turn to for excellent examples. I color copy the pages and send them to my restorationist. It shows many dolls of the same line so you can see and compare hair colors, make-up, etc. I highly recommend it to any Barbie collector. The most goreous book on the subject!
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Summary: Fabulously Helpful Reference Book and Guide!
Review: This book is so neat. It shows all kinds of really rare and beautiful dolls from the early years, and places them in context with period advertising and history. If you collect Barbie you're going to want all the dolls shown, and if you don't collect, you'll still learn some interesting information about this cultural icon.
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Summary: The beauty of Barbie!
Review: This book is so neat. It shows all kinds of really rare and beautiful dolls from the early years, and places them in context with period advertising and history. If you collect Barbie you're going to want all the dolls shown, and if you don't collect, you'll still learn some interesting information about this cultural icon.
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Summary: A definite must for any Barbie lover.
Review: This is a virtual encylopedia of the Barbie Doll. The book is packed with facts that only a true aficonado would know: how the Barbie doll was discovered in Europe when the creator saw her daughter playing with paper dolls and envisioned a three dimensional doll; the Japanese influence in the early Barbie which borrowed from Kabuki theater; the creation of Ken; the 'swirl' ponytail; the early 60's "Bubble cut" Barbie favored by collectors; special packaging including wedding party gift set, mix and match; the bendable leg era which began in 1964;the mod era of the late 60's; the athletic Barbie of the 70's.Female icons and social changes are also chronicled in the book: civil rights, women's liberation, Cher, Jane Fonda, Barbara Eden; the changing image of women. All of the trememendous societal upheavals of the 60's had an effect in how Barbie evolved. Advertising and make-up in the real world influenced Mattel's designs for Barbie. Always one step ahead of the social climate, Mattel's Barbie remains more than a toy. She is the mascot of her era and and a historical marker for understanding social changes in the lives of women in the US in the last 50 years.
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Summary: Great insights!
Review: This is a wonderful book, well written and very interesting to those of us who love Barbie. I would recommend it to all. The author has great insights and seems like a really nice person!
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