JK Rowling, tennis star Kim Clijsters and Sweden’s Crown Princess Victoria have joined the ranks of real life female role models that are being memorialized by the classic dolls. They join Oprah and German president Angela Merkel in having a one-of-a-kind doll made in their image as part of Barbie’s push to redefine its brand as the choice of smart women, and their little girls, world wide.
Like all the best dolls, these come with a variety of accessories, including, in Clijsters case, a doll version of Clijsters’ daughter Jada. Rowling’s doll is dressed in a miniature version of the black wool suit she wore to receive a 2009 Monsters and Critics award, while Crown Princess Victoria’s doll wears an evening gown and crown.
These women, according to Rosa Zeegers, Senior Vice President of Barbie International, “are true role models for girls of all ages, embodying the essence and values of Barbie. Whether you are four years old or 70 years old, we all need aspirational role models in our lives.”
Barbie has been around since 1959, when she debuted in a black and white zebra striped bathing suit and her signature top-knot pony tail. Her status as role model has long been a question of some heated controversy, particularly over her proportions, which are unrealistically tall, unhealthily thin and impossibly busty. In 1997, the Mattel company redesigned Barbie to give her a wider, more realistic waist, claiming that it made her more “suitable for modern fashions.” The doll’s shopping obsessed accessories didn’t help the image of bubble-headed femininity it projected until recently, when Mattel began to attempt to reform this classic toy.
Unfortunately for little “Harry Potter” lovers everywhere, these dolls will be collector’s items only – they won’t go on general sale, but rather stay in Mattel’s vault as a show piece for the up coming International Toy Fair.
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