The Australian Women\'s Weekly - June 2018

126 The Australian Women’s Weekly | JUNE 2018

PHOTOGRAPHY: © MATTEL INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

to experience things in an adult world that you

can’t yourself. I have a Barbie that is somewhat

similar to me, with long dark hair, and she’s

cosied-up to Johnny Depp in my cabinet.”

During my own playground days, Barbie was a

status symbol the way a handbag might be now.

Six-year-old cubbyhouse bouncers would demand

to know if you had a Barbie and if so, which

one? We didn’t do it knowingly but Barbie was

our way of signalling we were aware of trends and

had the means to be part of them. One girl had a

guaranteed invite to every birthday party because

she always arrived clutching a recognisably

rectangular present. My second-wave feminist

mother rejected everything Barbie stood for

but, like her friends, caved in to pester power.

Throughout the second half of the 20th

century, Barbie dominated the doll market.

Little girls were bewitched by her sparkly

gowns and tiny glinting accessories, but

Barbie also attracted her share of criticism.

Her pinched waist, white skin, blonde hair and

lean legs have been condemned for creating

unattainable standards for girls. The only

skerrick of lesh on Barbie’s inely engineered

form are her breasts, which are as large and

buoyant as twin blimps. (If further proof of

Barbie’s power is needed, her 1998 breast

reduction made the front page of The Wall

Street Journal.) As hundreds of articles point

out, a real woman with Barbie’s dimensions

would only have room for half a liver.

In the documentary The Most Famous Doll

In The World, a former toy seller recalls the

scandal caused by “the doll with the tits”.

Her uncanny and unattainable proportions

are said to have been based on a novelty

German doll and cartoon character, Bild Lilli,

who was a “woman of the night”. While

Barbie’s aspirations differed markedly from

her predecessor’s, her dimensions didn’t.

Karen says Barbie’s controversial physique is

largely the result of practical limitations and

insists that those who are critical of her tiny

waist “don’t understand the history of the doll.

When she was designed, with the couture and

fashions at the time, she had to have a very

slim waist so the three or four layers of fabric

that she wore would not make her look like a

Michelin Man. The dolls can be scaled down

but fabrics can’t.”

Mattel is on the record saying Barbie was

never meant to be real, but in 2016 the

company released three new body shapes (tall,

petite and curvy), and Barbie’s igure is not her

only attribute that’s moved with the times.

In Barbie’s earliest incarnations, she didn’t

seem to stray far from her dream house but, in

fact, Barbie’s very existence is the result of one

mother’s desire to open her daughter’s eyes to

a future outside the home. When creator Ruth

Handler unveiled the irst-of-its-kind doll at

the New York Toy Fair in 1959, the men at the

50s
The 1950s Barbies
were an evolution
of paper dolls. Ruth
Handler had seen
her daughter,
Barbara, project
her aspirations
onto the paper
cut-out and
created a three
dimensional “teen
fashion model”.

70s

Barbie continued

to conquer the

world, winning

Olympic gold in

1975.

60s

Barbie got serious.

In the ’60s, Barbie

became a fashion

designer, nurse and

an executive.

80s

“Day-to-Night”

Barbie wore a

cocktail dress

under her pink

powersuit.