Printable paper dolls collections are plentiful on the Web. For today's picks, I chose four prolific artists who have created their own line of paper dolls, and one collector who is scanning vintage paper doll books that are now out-of-print. Among them, surely you'll find plenty to delight a child in your life, while reminiscing about the paper dolls of your childhood.
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Gail's celebrity paper dolls are hand drawn using CorelDraw and Photo Paint, and frequently include "actual outfits worn by each celebrity." Categories include Movie Stars, Teen Idols, Twilight, and Famous Americans. For younger kids, head straight to the Fiction/Fantasy category where you'll find Santa Claus, Barbie, Cinderella, Snow White, Dora, and many more childhood favorites.
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Rachel was born in Alaska, is a librarian in Alabama, and is a prolific paper doll artist. She creates her art with black pens and Photoshop, and has over 310 pages of paper dolls (in PDF and PNG formats) on her site. In addition to paper dolls with foldable tabs for printing on regular paper, Rachel also has magnetic dolls that can either be printed on magnetic paper, or created with adhesive magnetic sheets. Rachel's collection is awesome, and she also has an excellent set of links to other paper doll bloggers.
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Fabric and totebag designer Patty Reed "has always loved paper dolls and has collected them since childhood." Her paper doll collection includes three big sisters, and three little sisters. Simply click on any of the sisters to print out the doll and her wardrobe. Some of the dolls have just one page of clothes, but others have four or six pages of outfits. Patty recommends gluing each sister "to cardstock using spray adhesive before cutting out, to ensure a longer life for your doll."
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Inspired by their World History studies, homeschooling mom Nadene drew these paper dolls with her kids. Organized into five separate PDF downloads, this paper doll collection includes Modern Clothes, Fashion of Past Eras, Ancient History, Ancient China / Japan / India / North American Indians, and Men of Ancient History. Yes, there is some overlap in the topics of the five downloads, but this page shows thumbnails of each page, so you'll know what you're getting before you click the download links.
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Teri Pettit's vintage paper doll site has been lovingly created by scanning out-of-print paper doll books and sets in her personal collection. With more than twenty-six "books" to choose from, you are sure to find something to tickle your imagination and memory. Be sure to visit the extensive Betsy McCall collection, which has the annual sets from 1951 to 1961. These were the paper dolls of my childhood, and I found them every bit as beautiful as I remembered.
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By Barbara J. Feldman. Originally written on Jan 29, 2013.
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Honorable Mentions
The following links are either new discoveries or sites that didn't make it into my newspaper column because of space constraints. Enjoy!
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