Six months ago, I promised an update on my Barbie® den upon completing my vision for it.  Of course, any collector would know that one's collection is never quite complete.  I constantly change my displays as new dolls come in, and the occasional doll is sent to a new home.  When I wrote the post, I had a total of two sparsely populated glass cabinets in the den. Most of my dolls were stored in a large built-in closet.

I reached a turning point in my collecting habits a few weeks after posting that blog entry.  I decided that it was not worth having all these dolls unless I could display most of them.  I didn't want them to sit in their respective boxes in a closet, only to be admired when I pull them out for a photo session, so I talked my spouse into allowing me to purchase three additional display cabinets.  It took weeks to pull all the dolls out of their boxes, dress them, and arrange them in the cabinets.

I also hung up some framed Barbie® sketches to give the space a very Barbie®-centric ambience. I left a smattering of Barbie® books on the coffee table and arranged some little dioramas all over the room. Lastly, I got an inexpensive dresser to organize my doll fashions, accessories, beadwork materials, and other doll accoutrements. I can't tolerate a cluttered doll room.

I go through periods of time when I don't seem to have any energy or enthusiasm for dolls, but seeing my collection on display always makes me happy. :)

How do you store and display your dolls?

I attended "Everyday's a Holiday with Barbie®", the 2014 National Barbie Doll Collectors Convention in Nashville, Tennessee a few weeks ago.  The convention officially ran from July 23-26, but I was told that some of the best convention activities are unofficial--room sales, parties hosted by doll artists, etcetera, so my husband and I checked in at the Renaissance Hotel in downtown Nashville on the 21st to take advantage of everything this gathering of Barbie aficionados has to offer.  I am so glad that we did because my favorite convention activity turned out to be room shopping!  There's something especially thrilling about hunting for Barbie dolls, accessories, fashions and diorama pieces on several hotel floors where sellers leave their rooms open for conventioneers to enter and browse their staggering displays of merchandise.  I was not expecting the scale at which this took place. 

Anyway, there were so many wonderful sights, sounds and people throughout the convention week that just the thought of writing about the entire experience is exhausting. Instead of writing a novella, I'll simply share a little photo gallery with some captions.

The "Red, White, Blue and Pink" fashion show where participants modeled human scale Barbie® fashions from every era was a big hit and deserves its own photo gallery:

Lastly, I want to give a shoutout to our table hostess, Julia Bush, and our tablemates Elizabeth, Allison, Barb, Lisa, Debbie, Kim and Kathleen. Thank you for making this convention so fun!  I hope to see everyone again at the 2015 convention in Arlington, Virginia. 

xoxo
J

I'm quite excited about this year's Barbie® Fashion Model Collection.  For 2014, the Silkstone doll collection will have an Italian high fashion theme.  Barbie® is no stranger to the runways of the world's fashion capitals, so having Milan as the next source of fashion inspiration is a brilliant concept. 

So far, only Fiorella™ Barbie® doll (shown here) has been officially released. Members of the Barbie® Fan Club have been treated to sneak peeks of several upcoming dolls, including another glamorous Silkstone doll called Dulcissima™.  You can catch a glimpse of her in the teaser video below, which features the storyline created for Fiorella™.