Thursday, March 14, 2019

United Colors of Benetton Christie 1990



Some time ago, when my United Colors of Benetton Barbie had her debut on my blog, I mentioned that my further plans as for the series was to purchase Christie. I didn’t entertain high hopes for her early arrival though. I’d spent too much time trying to achieve a compromise between Barbie’s condition and her price and I expected Christie to come just as difficult. You may imagine my surprise, when Nana Arima put a link to an ad in the comments section and when I opened it, there she was, my Christie. And the ad had been posted just a couple of hours earlier. I was pretty sure, the doll was no longer available, but I still wrote to the owner asking her about the doll and the transfer data in the same message. I know that’s not how you do it, but I wanted the doll, badly. The next morning I woke up in the state of great confusion as something hard just hit on my skull. That was my toddler trying to wake me up with my phone and she was evidently satisfied with her actions that she readied for another blow. I managed to intercept the phone, to her great displeasure and protests and I thought I might check out the doll. The terrific news made the headache disappear momentarily!




I’ve already described the three waves of United Color of Benetton x Mattel collaboration so I’ll focus on my Christie now. The doll is just lovely, so sweet, happy and innocent looking! She arrived in great need of a bath of course, but that’s to be expected. Her hair needed only a wash and a bit of a conditioner to shine again and I just recreated the factory partline and the style. I’m glad she has no bangs that would obscure her pretty face. Her complexion is quite dark and I’m happy it is. Her make-up is almost nonexistent. There’s just a tiny bit of a blue eyeshadow to grace her brown and blue (?) eyes and some soft red lipstick and that’s it. She’s a natural beauty and she needs nothing more. I love her puffy lower eyelid. I compared my only 2 Christie- molded dolls and I was astonished at the striking difference between them. They couldn’t be more dissimilar. The difference in their skin tone, their eye make-up and their lips is unbelievable when you consider they share the same headmold! The feelings the two dolls evoke are entirely different as well. To me Christie is a happy, lively and kind next door kind of girl. But Morocan Barbie is royalty! She’s dreamy and mysterious. Plus, she’s had more sleep I presume, since her lower eyelids are far less puffy.





Benetton Christie is not perfect, and it’s evident she’d been plenty played with. Her hip joints are loose for one thing and for another, one of her eyebrows is slightly shorter. It’s not bad at all, since her skin is so dark. Her previous owner seemed to love her so much she could eat her and apparently even tried, because her right thumb is missing. But the owner had informed be about the thumb before I paid and this fact didn’t discourage me a tiny bit. I mean, I buy mostly used dolls and I don’t expect them to be perfect in every sense. I’m prepared to accept certain flaws, I only wish to be aware of them at the time of payment. I hate to discover them when I take the doll out of her packaging. Fortunately, this time the seller turned out to be an honest person.


Christie’s stock isn’t complete, but the most important elements of her clothing and jewelry are still there. She comes with a hoodie that looks really warm and comfy and I’d love to have one for myself. It’s of course very colorful. The white hoodie’s been trimmed with a red ribbon and there are various patterns all over it- triangles, stripes, flowers, you name it. The sleeveless half turtleneck underneath seems to be very much in conflict with the hoodie. The colors are no longer so vibrant but other than that, it looks great and the patterns are even crazier than on the hoodie. The doll is wearing a yellow scarf tied at her waist and fortunately, the magenta leggings are plain, otherwise, you’d get blind with the colors and patterns and all that. Christie’s missing her thigh-high red socks, her yellow sneakers and her purse that matches her turtleneck. I’d love to have these too, but I’m not prepared to pay ransom for her, so I just found some pink sneakers in my own stock and she’ll have to settle for what she has. Her ring is missing too, but her hoop earrings are in place. I must say the pink earrings look very nice with her dark complexion.








A collector is such an insatiable creature. I first wanted Barbie, then I longed for Christie and now that I have them both, I would like to own Ken as well. Does it ever stop? I hope not because it would mean the end of my collection. Meanwhile, here’s my two Benetton girls.





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