DollClans, a BJD company from Thailand, is now celebrating their 6th year anniversary. The company has just introduced their first female doll, Fray.
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Q: Our first interview with you was after the release of your very first head, Kien back in 2012 You have since made many more dolls in two size lines. Can you give me a brief list of the order in which the dolls and bodies were released?
A: The list in order of released doll, would be:
2011 : Kien, Vezeto
2012 : Siber, Benkel & Jaquer, introduce U Line body
2013 : Koyote, Phython
2014 : Wyper, Vezeto (revised version), introduce S Line body, Rynx
2015 : Dauber, Kougar
2016 : Young Vezeto
2017 : Bones and Fray,introduce U Line GIRL body.
Q: So you have now released your first girl doll! How long has she been under construction?
A: Fray has been under construction for about 2 years, for both head and body.
Since we have a new sculptor to sculpt the doll head, we needed to check the design and had a lot of discussions and adjustments with the sculptor.
We respect the sculptor’s original style, so Fray is quite new for us to handle. (We have only sold boys since the beginning. Not to mention with a different sculptor.)
Q: So is Fray is the first sculpt that your new sculptor has produced for you?
A: Yes. He goes by the name ‘Snakelek’ for his studio. He is also a wonderful painter with a unique style. His sculpture work reflects his own painting style as well.
Q: How do you come up with the names for your dolls?
A : First, we try to come up with a doll’s name based on their organization (their clan), for example, the members of HellHound clan will mostly have a name based on dog/wild dog breeds (wolves), while Sweet Poison is a snake clan, so the member’s name will be based on a snake’s name.
Some dolls might have a different name from the reason above, as they have their own characters before we think of their clan, or they do not belong to any clan (which we call a ‘Free Member’ – They have a code inside the head sculpt- an FM).
For example Kien has his name based on Thai slang, due to his personality. Or Bones, who is the doctor that really loves everything about skulls and the skeleton.
Q: You always create a sort of character background for each doll. Are the dolls created and then a character developed for them, or does the character idea come first and you decide what he or she would look like?
A: Overall we will plan our story around each clan and the character’s connection.
The DollClans world is quite large and keeps expanding, so each character will have their own story and will be related to another character. They have their own habits and different behaviors in the story. After that, we design the visual of each doll before sending a design to the sculptor.
However, sometimes the actual doll might be sculpted differently from our own imagination. At some point, a character in the story might be changed also, based on make-up design and our staffs’ discussion of the doll, or maybe he changes when the story progresses or is affected by another character’s behavior.
In the end, these stories are just for our little world we have fun with them while working.
We have fun making a story for our dolls, just the same as other doll owners.
They are our children and we love to see them in the story we created.
We are very happy when people say they like to read the story and enjoy our world. And we hope everyone will keep enjoying it.
Q: What can you tell me about Fray’s character?
A: Fray is a bar owner, which is just a front. Actually she owns many business in Mundane district, (the seedy side of town).
She is strict, decisive, and has a strong heart. Maybe more so than men sometimes.
She sells information and offers help to any clan, in exchange for things which she desires.
Q: Is Fray a Free Member?
A: Yes she is. She is also the second member who obtained the Free Member code in her head sculpt, after Bones.
Q: Are you currently planning any new dolls to be released? If so, will they be S or U line? Boy or girl?
A: We have certain new dolls that will be released in 2018. However we would like to keep them a secret at the moment. Before we move forward on a new doll, we have more limited dolls that will be released at Dollism Plus Tokyo 2017 to focus on. Please looking forward to it!
Q: is there anything you would like to add?
A: First we would like to thank you BJDcollectasy for your kindly interest in DollClans and the offer of this wonderful interview, which might make people understand more about how we work with our dolls and story, that maybe is different from others.
Thank you all old and new customers who are supporting us.
To old customers, please kindly support us as always, and to new customers, we hope DollClans dolls can impress you more or less and we hope you will like our dolls.
Last, still we are a small company with a small staff. We are doing our best to meet expectations and we hope to do everything within our capability to improve our service. We hope you will enjoy yourself anytime you visit us at DollClans!
DollClans’ first article with BJDcollectasy
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