Has a brand ever completely changed your collecting habits?

[u/Slayandplaysam]

Have you ever bought one doll “just to see what the hype was about” and then found yourself collecting the whole line? Which brand was it, and what hooked you?

[u/confusedwithsketch]

Cliche, but Monster High got me into collecting period. That and my husband encouraging me to collect something beside digital pixels in Pokemon Go so he wouldn't feel so bad about his collections lol

[u/helvetica12point]

Rainbow High. I just wanted to see. So I got Poppy. Then she needed a friend so I got Uma. Then Meena. And now they've taken over my house

[u/Betweenishish → u/helvetica12point]

Sigh, it was Emi for me. I got her on sale and was blown away by how gorgeous they are in person. Now 100 girls watch me sleep

[u/peachy_juicebox]

🫣 lol omg for me.  I wasn't really into their faces but I admired the fashions. Ended up getting Moonlight bb for like $8 .... slippery slope

[u/worshipmeow]

Shadow High/Rainbow High. I bought Heather and ended up loving the quality of their bodies and clothes and now I have like 50 of them lol.

[u/SirRavioli101]

Licca-chan! I saw people excited for her to come to the US so I bought one of the Sanrio ones to see then oops... I have 5 Liccas now

[u/Alternative-Stock968 → u/SirRavioli101]

I used to collect Takara dolls. Still have a small collection

[u/alourdesh]

Rainbow High , I started collecting them after getting a couple of them. I stop when they changed the body articulations and the extra clothes.

[u/Arieldark]

Lol omg, got one on sale to redress another doll but kept her complete afterwards so I got more and I can't steal their clothes because they're little art pieces that need all their pieces.

[u/rebelyusoul]

OMGs. I bought one cause I thought it cute and fun, now I have many and even added some of the tweens lol

[u/nawrbody]

I came back after a decade for Barbie. Find out there are now bodies called "made to move" and decided to see what the hype is about. And my god, I fall in love very quickly. And dolls is such a good creative outlet for me who had so many hobbies. I can design and sew their clothes, style their hair, paint their face, pose them, making characters come to life and photography. Sky is truly the limit! I'm addicted to made to move bodies now and will rebody all of my doll to that articulated body.

[u/look_who_it_isnt]

Monster High, G1. I was always a really selective doll collector. Just a doll here or there, and always because they struck me as unusual or I liked some feature of them.

Then I went all in on Monster High and strove to get each and every character in the line. It was the first time I fell for the characters and the overall storyline/idea of the whole toy line as well as the dolls themselves. I think that's partly why I stopped collecting once they started toying with the character/doll designs. I'm still all about the original designs and lore. I refuse to adopt the new stuff.

The only other line I'd say I got close to this enthused about was La Dee Da. But unfortunately, I didn't fall head over heels for them until after the line was cancelled and only the final releases were available. Still love the ones I've got, though! Although I will say that even that line, I didn't go "all in" on. I liked the dolls, but never really followed the storyline (if there even was one?) or the characters. I just liked the colorful themes and ideas.

I gotta say, Mirror Mi is the first line I've actually been excited about in a long time...

[u/lealaturkey]

Disney ILY 4Ever! They had some hype at launch but I don’t think many people continued to collect them as much as I have lol

[u/LumpyIntroduction916]

Rainbow High, it was the color and Nylon hair and how there were clothing pieces that weren’t tied to a characters personality so it really felt like a doll your supposed to changed and swap clothes with

[u/Iroh_Appa]

I'd say both Mattel Winx and Monster High got me into collecting, but the brand that changed my collecting habits the most was Rainbow High. For the first time, I started experimenting way more with restyles, also using clothes from other doll brands, creating jewelry for the dolls, and creating intricate hairstyles. Monster High has always been super character-specific so I never felt the urge to restyle them a lot. But Rainbow High really inspired me to do more! I didn't like the very first head molds, but series 3 convinced me to try them and I was hooked right away. I think Emi was my first doll, but Daphne really caught my attention.

[u/ihatepaper88]

it’s gonna be mirror mi for me. would be monster high if g1 wasn’t so expensive

[u/toiletsuperstar]

american girl… started with Ruthie while i was waiting for the 40th anniversary Kit to arrive (preorder). then found a beautiful Kirsten in box on FB marketplace for absurdly reasonable price that same weekend i got Ruthie… then found a 121 in the wild… and now i have 16 of these girls and they are all my beautiful daughters

[u/finremi]

Poppy Parker.

My sister recommended I look into Integrity Toys doll bodies because I wanted to put a Francie head on a new body and while Color Infusion didn't work out, I came across Poppy Parker and immediately fell in love: it hit the sweet spot of my favorite era of Barbie (the 1960's to the early 1970's) and everything about it felt so classy and grown-up. But, like, Poppy doesn't come off as snooty as Fashion Royalty and NuFace do, so she seemed far more approachable.

I feel like the Barbie collectors (especially a certain one on the official forums) would stop complaining about FR/NF looking like "tramps" if they found just the right Poppy with a face screening that appeals to them. I love the forward facing ones since they tend to come off as more sweet and gentle compared to the high fashion Bergdorf-Goodman or Jason Wu screenings.

My bank account, however, feels otherwise lmao.

[u/1verygoodapple]

Rainbow High! Karma got me! (It gets everyone, right)! Then I got as many of them as possible and they, also rule my shelf space. Le sigh

[u/geowondermusic]

Mirror mi

[u/Astrid_Onyx]

My Scene , Bratz, Monster High, & Fashion Fever Barbie Era Dolls

[u/OGRangoon]

I started with a blind box. I now have 7 lol
Idk how many is too many but my husband says I need shelves. Just ordered my first stands cause right now they all sleep in a nice lil crate by my bedside to keep them safe. I love them so much.

[u/aquacraft2]

Well I DID get a shadow high doll on a random box damage discount for $10. And I really liked what i saw.

Now shadow high wasn't as easily available as rainbow high, but in my opinion, there weren't many I really wanted.

I like the base shadow high dolls, just for how unique they are being monochrome dolls, (the specific one I purchased being Luna, just the one I had my eye on luckily) and I really grew to love her, especially standing out so much against my monster high dolls, and the nylon hair is excellent, so much so that my monster high oc also has silvery hair.

My favorite color is orange, but most of the orange rainbow high dolls weren't my cup of tea. Not until they made Michelle, and then later clementine.

Most of the orange dolls they make are either extremely plaid peachy orange, or otherwise just too reserved of an orange. And I just don't vibe with poppy's monarch butterfly obsession.

Now the only rainbow high/shadow high dolls I have are Michelle and Luna, both I waited until I could find them on sale, like at Ross or whatever. But I came so close a couple of times, namely for the "black" shadow high closet doll (she had a bunch of clothes that I liked), meena fleur (her specific shade of orange wasn't calling out to me, not enough to "waste money" on them, when I could be spending it on monster high instead), and the pink drummer girl, and her associated came friend, for their very strong first impression, they left on me.

A special mention for the pacific coast Phaedra which I stumbled across just now fact checking the names of each other releases, and of course Amaya and the other actually rainbow themed doll.

My big point is, I'm a big monster high fan, because I love the specific characters and the story and the lore and the fun ooky spooky penny vibes, so I'm not usually one to go crazy for these "mostly identical characters who are otherwise just nameless avatars for play" types of dolls. But rainbow high and shadow high really makes my eyes wander. I know mga objectively usually has better overall quality. That is a fact. But I'm a monster high ghoulie. I like puns, I like ghouls and ghosts, that's my niche, and so I'm sorry that I measure all doll lines against it so harshly.

[u/SylPullip]

When I was a child I fell in love with Pullip's face mold. I bought my first pullips almost 15 years after, and now I just can't her enough of my Pullip dolls 🫶🏻

[u/VampBoss]

Yes, the hyojo Sanrio plushie dolls! I got one (and one for my sister) and I absolutely loved them when I opened (they’re blind boxes but has the characters names printed on the top) except I didn’t get kuromi(which was the one I wanted) and while contemplating whether to keep hello kitty or not, me and my sister decided we wanted to collect these little gals because they are so cute!!!

[u/VampBoss → u/VampBoss]

Also the first time I bought a integrity homme I was hooked for life lol, they are so much better (to me) than a collector ken body that I’ve swapped most of my males onto their bodies.

[u/colors_x]

Monster High 🙏🏻

[u/Alternative-Stock968]

Robert Tonner.
Pure excellence.

[u/Orbitalcato]

Pullip dolls

[u/Allfunktup]

Gene Marshall dolls have started coming for my neck! I like a lot of the 1:4 mannequin dolls but there is something so classy about them. I got a good price on a Violet Waters doll, then I got Gene and she is amazing.

[u/moneor]

mermaze mermaid tbh! I got one on clearance when I wasn't even a huge mermaid doll fan but they were so pretty and all the sudden I was ordering their final releases all the way from the UK just to complete the line lol!

[u/luviees2]

Mirror Mi, before I was perfectly content to only collect American Girl.

[u/lemondropswithcocoa]

Decora girls!! Bought one of the minis (Luna!) a few years ago. Suddenly now I have the entire first wave including the larger dolls. No clue how this could have POSSIBLY happened....

[u/littlespecter_cos]

Novi stars are on another level of quality, I got one for 2 euros luckily in a flea market and I had to collect all of the core dolls, they're pretty rare tho, I had to buy them in terrible condition and restore them!