Cleaning and protection of dolls
your doll Clothes
I have to be honest here: cleaning fabric is a very scary subject, too simple and too complicated at the same time. It’s even more complicated because old and/or collectible doll clothes are shaped the way they are (full and fluffy), because the fabric is starched to the max. starch is water soluble. Educate yourself about conservation and let common sense be your guide. But here are some useful tools and techniques:
SOFT BRUSH
But not too smooth. Think of this as a little whiskey broom for your wrists. A variety of cheap but NEW brushes will do. Different sizes and if they are not stiff enough, use strong scissors to trim and shorten the bristles a bit.
COMPRESSED GAS
The kind that comes in a can with a long tube/nozzle and works great for getting french fry crumbs off your keyboard. It also works on doll clothes. It may be all you need to freshen up a doll’s outfit.
VACUUM CLEANER (hose type)
Sort of like compressed air, just going in the other direction. To make it really fancy, for delicate fabrics and all, make yourself a frame and staple some nylon mesh around it. This will involve a trip into hardware history and a bit of woodworking, but it can’t be helped. If making a frame is out of your reach, get a small piece of metal mesh and fold a few layers of masking tape around the edge. It would be a shame to have neglected this step and ruin something all pretty and glossy by catching it on a jagged metal end of the screen. If you have skin, and all the best collectors do, the duct tape will also make it easier to keep the blood inside the skin because these ends are always sharp. Vacuum through this and the buttons and ties will stay on whatever you’re cleaning.
SUDS, warm soapy water
Look carefully at what I have written, not the water, but the SUDS*. Make yourself a sink full of foam, apply it to the dirty parts of the fabric, and apply it with one of your brushes. Vacuum everything again.
MOLD:
Get rid of it by moistening the stain in lemon juice and salt, let it dry in the sun (mold hates the sun). Use your brush and vacuum to remove what is left. If this doesn’t work, try hydrogen peroxide plus sun, but wait for a bit of a fade.
your doll Hatred
Dandruff shampoo won’t do it. Being on top as it is, dust is likely to settle on your dolls’ hair. A toothbrush will remove the dust and what the heck! Try a new hairstyle! To do more than this, you better know exactly what you’re doing.
your doll “Skin”
In general, distilled water and cotton swabs won’t hurt anything, unless the doll is made of celluloid. (See below.) If this doesn’t work, add a small squirt of detergent (shampoo). Beyond this, you risk cleaning up more than just dirt. Go slow, but try, in order of aggressive solvency…
- Alcohol. If you don’t have shellac thinner on hand, use vodka instead. (Seriously, liquor is little more than a mixture of alcohol and water.)
- Paint thinner. Or tag remover, same thing but it smells like lemons.
- Lacquer thinner. Only in enameled porcelain and with VERY care with the painted parts.
*Chris from Bearly Believable Gifts offers this for cleaning stuffed toys (Teddy Bears) and it will work for doll clothes too.
I put a stream in the sink and then fill it with warm water. I only use SUDS, not the water itself, and thoroughly rub the foam into the fur with my hands. You don’t want to wet the fur, just lather it up. You can test most fabrics in a small space, but I haven’t had any problems yet. When dry, I use a 1-2″ paint brush to “bush” the bear’s fur. Very simple, and this technique also removes most of the oil that floats in the air and clings to the fur.
Chris also suggests that staying in the freezer will kill allergic dust mites. Finally, he advises against having stuffed animals in the kitchen where they absorb cooking oil and odors. Clever lady!
A BIG RED LETTER WARNING!!!
Vintage plastic (celluloid)
Very old dolls were made of celluloid. Interesting celluloid material, but not pretty at all. It was invented in 1856 and was the first plastic to come onto the market, largely as a replacement for ivory. It pretty much went out of style in the 1950s. The only place you find it today is in ping-pong balls. What’s interesting is that it starts out as cotton waste that is processed to become celluloid, cellulose lacquer, or guncotton. Gun cotton is what they use to fire large shells from the guns on battleships. Yes, guncotton is explosive just like celluloid! (And, for that matter, lacquer also burns like a son of a gun.) Also, if it gets wet, and stays wet, it oozes nitric acid. Nitric acid is not only corrosive, it is also a powerful oxidizer.
There are stories(?) of celluloid glue balls exploding and killing people. Men’s collars used to be made of celluloid. But the most important celluloid for collectors are vintage dolls. Antique doll heads/faces are made from this material. Here’s what the pros have to say about celluloid. It will break. It cannot be avoided, it can only be slowed down. As it breaks down, it releases camphor, which makes Campho-phenique smell like it does. Store celluloid dolls in explosion proof cabinets (I swear to God) or in the freezer. Clean with distilled water and dry carefully, but understand that even water accelerates decomposition into corrosive nitric acid.