African Themed Doll

We had our doll club meeting last night, and those who made them, brought in their dolls for the African Theme challenge. There were some amazing dolls and such a lot of variety. This was my entry. She is a Julie McCullough design, entitled, "The Muse".   Description follows below.

     

The instructions called for FME (free motion embroidery) on the robe, but I just dug into my beads and just starting beaded with abandon. I followed the patterns in the fabric in a free form way.

  

The head dress takes in the three fabrics I used, the robe, the lining made with silk and the cotton headdress, and finished off with some beading.  The beads around her neck are a variety of big and small, ceramic and bone. I found some tooth shaped beads on eBay. The medallion in the center I found at Michaels and thought it went so well with her theme.

The base is made of 2 wooden coasters, a small wooden door knob and a small wooden mini plate. Then I trimmed it with gold soutache and wrapped the gold soutache around the post and finished it with a vintage button and some metal beads. The only thing I didn't do well was her nose. For some reason her nose insisted on being crooked and thankfully when you see her in real life, it's not so obvious. Had I continued to take it out and restitch it yet again I would have developed holes in the fabric, so I left well enough alone.