If the child is very young, and just starting doll play, a fully dress-able doll might not be appropriate for them. If the child is older, and requires more interaction with their doll, accessories, play food, or even other dolls to play with are therefore required. I would say that the three main characteristics, aside construction, of a Waldorf doll are: a genuine representation of human body proportions, a blank expression, and made of natural materials.

Starting your dollmaking adventure, supplies and tips to get started via Fig and me. The techniques that are most widely associated with waldorf doll making are not Waldorf. They were prevalent at the time that Waldorf education came around and were appropriated by the many doll makers who started creating dolls based on their education theories.

These are techniques for cloth doll making, that had been around for many years before the education movement arose. A body pattern that resembles the proportions of a child.

Age vary the proportions so here you have to pay attention to the head to body ratio. More or less, the arms reach as long as the hips, with the thumbs positioned at the seam where the legs join to the torso.

Feet and hands are proportionate to the overall body, and the head, VERY important, is not too large or too small compared to the body length. I cannot stress enough the importance of the head size. If you are making a baby, then the torso and legs and head are about equal in size. If you are making a child over 1 year old the proportions start to change quite a bit. I mostly use the proportions of my daughter when she was about 5 years old.

Look at your children and you will see that their heads do not go over their shoulders, that they are centred. Another way of deciding the proportions is to picture your doll inside a pentagon, with head, hands and feet at each vertex. Therefore, when the doll has her arms stretched out and her legs, all distances from each point are equal. Most waldorf dolls are sewn with European-made fabric, since that is where this educational approach originated.

It can either be a cotton interlock both sides look the same or a cotton jersey one side looks knit, the other one has a purl. You could also use wool jersey although it is less common. There is a list of suppliers at the bottom of this post that can help you in sourcing these wonderful materials.

This fabric is made specifically for doll making , so it is very sturdy, has low-pill action, and it comes in a variety of shades that resembles skin tones. Please bear in mind that once you stuff the doll, the fabric stretches and lets through the colour of the white wool, therefore all skin tones of fabric will lighten up once stuffed.

I have heard people using bamboo and claiming is a natural product, which in fact is no different than rayon. It is made with a natural resource, but the fabrication of said product is so toxic and so far removed from the initial fibre that it is mostly a rayon-like product. Wool has many properties , and I am not going to elaborate here, but only from a doll making point of view: this stuffing is the BEST. Because it retains its shape, it is easy to tear into small pieces, it has loft, and it can be compressed and you can wound it into an extremely firm head.

It can also be felted, and if you want to experiment with needle-felting you need to use wool to achieve the best results, in my humble opinion. From another perspective, wool retains heat, it is a biodynamic fibre that reacts to its environment and has memory.

I could go on and on, but I will spare you. If you are interested in checking the many properties of wool and would like to learn more how it is used in dollmaking or where to buy it, head to this post:. So from these basic tenets, most waldorf-style dolls are made. Now we go deeper. I do not create Waldorf dolls, I stopped doing so a long time ago. At least I thought that initially my dolls were to be presumed in that category because I consciously prescribed to the tenets of Waldorf education, in creating a doll that spoke to the child, and that had no expression, made exclusively with natural materials.

But doll making turned into an art form for me, it gave me a fantastic medium to exercise my creativity and I was blessed with the opportunity of expanding my skills and knowledge of doll making by leaving the realm of Waldorf-inspired dolls. I would say my dolls still hold some of the simplicity, at least to an extent, of Waldorf dolls, however they are much more elaborate, they do have expressions, I not always use natural materials for their clothes, and there are definite personalities coming to life in my dolls.

While I still try to make my dolls accessible to a child if they were to play with it, I firmly believe the majority of my dolls are more suitable for much older children, or children at heart.

So even though the vast majority of the dolls out there are not considered Waldorf dolls, we have to call them one way. A doll with a simple expression, made of natural materials, with a rolled head, lightly needle sculpted, it is not a Waldorf doll, but it is the closest approximation of a category. Do not get hung up on titles, I lost them a long time ago and I am glad I did. The less you add, the more the child has to put in, which is the aim of the toy: to help them construct their own world.

I went from creating a simple doll, sturdy and not too heavy, with very simple clothing that could be easily changed by my then very young children, to dolls with ears, bums, knees, belly buttons, lips and what not. While my dolls are in no way appropriate for a small child, creating them gives me a satisfaction beyond compare. In a way, I am happy to have strayed so far from the realm of Waldorf doll making. I have been calling my dolls Natural Fiber Art Dolls for quite a while now and I feel this title best describe them though it is a bit long for my liking.

The best advice I can give you is to buy a pattern from a reputable doll maker. If you are a VERY beginner dollmaker, i. It is a 9" tall doll, made with repurposed cashmere body.

You will learn to sculpt a little head the 'waldorf' way , to embroider a simple face, basic body proportions, and in the end you will accomplish a cute little doll with very little cost in materials and time. Later that year I released a second pattern, called the Little Fig. As you might be able to notice, I am publishing my patterns in order of difficulty, so that you can learn with each and every single one. The Little Fig doll pattern helps you create a 14" tall doll, you can learn to add more facial features with needle sculpting, how to create a wig out of mohair yarn, and how to construct a doll with very pleasing toddler proportions.

I prefer to use natural fibers because babies chew on these, and natural fibers are just nicer. When in doubt, make your hat a little big. If the fabric has stretch, make the hat stretchy around the face and around the neck. Trim the excess away and turn right side out. Position the head inside of the cap and body. To get the cap to stay where I want it, I generally tack the bottom corners with pins before I start sewing.

Sew around the whole thing, use a blanket stitch or a running stitch, or a whip stitch, whatever seems to work for you. I go around the neck twice for durability. When attaching the cap, catch not only the skin fabric but also go into the wool a bit to add strength and anchor the whole thing together.

I attach the corners of the hat at the chin with a pin and then sew. Raw edges go to the inside. Stitch the bottom of the cap folded under to the neck of the bodysuit. If you want to make these to sell, you are totally welcome to. I learned this from a wonderful Waldorf preschool teacher who was so generous with her knowledge that I would like to pass on the favor.

Please, though, do not sell my directions. However, please feel free to link to them! Please also note that I have made likely close to of these dolls. Feel free to ask me questions if you have any!

This one is wonderful. I wish to make one for my daughter. Where is the pattern for the body and the suit of the doll? Thank you. My daughter is so excited for this doll! Thank you very much for your tutorial. My question is about washing and hot drying them, which will have to take place at least every week because of regulation. How about steaming them for 10 minutes, would this damage them less?

Thanks if you can make the time for this Marie. Cut around the outline of the head your drew only after tugging on the sewn head covering to make sure the stitches are tight enough. Slide the head inside of the outer covering and smooth out any wrinkles before tying it off under the head at the top of the neck. When the doll skin fits properly and is tied tight it will resemble the covered head in the image below.

The doll skin should fit very snugly around the head so the nose is clearly visible and distinct. The eyes and cheeks will become more distinctive as you hand embroider the eyes and mouth onto the head because that draws the doll skin fabric in more tightly. If the doll skin fabric is too saggy around the head, remove the head covering and place the doll head on it again — with the nose still facing toward the fold. Trace another line around the head and repeat the same steps you did above.

While you can make the entire head all by yourself, there are several steps where an extra pair of hands that will come in handy to ensure the string being tied will be extra super duper tight while the untied part of the head in your hands also retains its stiffness. If you have any hand dexterity issues or have had carpal tunnel, your hands will likely ache a good bit during and after working on the Waldorf doll head. Many years of playing sports, coaching sports, and typing all day can make my hands ache — the head making process was not an exception.

Do not let fear over the complexity of making a Waldorf doll head prevent you from grabbing some supplies and getting started making these keepsake homemade gifts for a little girl you love today.

I am patience challenged but learned the process and have made many heads since getting slowly through the first one. You start by drawing circles where you would like your eyes to be. Draw your circles smaller than you think you should, as embroidering them always tends to make them larger.

You will need your long doll making needle, an embroidery needle and the floss for your eyes and mouth. You will need to get a length of floss approximately 15 inches and separate it into a single strand for the eyes.

This is a huge tip, as many new makers try to use the entire 7 strands, which makes the eyes very bulky and it is difficult to keep a nice shape with. You could go with a traditional hair color or get a little funky when making a fairy princess and choose yarn with little adornments in it or cool colors. Whatever type of yarn you choose should be of a natural and not a synthetic material.

Unlike the wool stuffing for the head, natural yarn is readily available and typically does not cost much more than synthetic yarn. Natural yarn will wear far better over time after heavy play. If you want your Waldorf doll do have curly hair you must use a natural yarn to garner success with the curly process I will walk you through in this tutorial. Boucle yarn, especially the DollyMo brand that was created by dollmakers, is very popular, affordable, and great to work with when wig making.

Choose where you want the eyes to go along the eye line, and draw a circle or whatever shape of eyes you wish to create in the desired spots. Make sure the eyes are placed evenly and level on the face — double check using your measuring tape, and are as equal in dimension as you can get them. Using the doll making needle and a single strand of embroidery floss in your chosen eye color, go from the top of the head down through the head and out the center of the eye circle using a vertical stitch.

Try to keep the stitches that you will be bringing up to the top of the head as thin as possible, but do not fret about this too much because you can trim them down before sewing on the wig. As a novice hand embroiderer, I opted for more turns through the eye circle with the floss than were actually needed. Still using the doll making needle, go back and forth through the head placing horizontal stitches until you fill out the eye circles that you drew.

While you need to pull the embroidery floss going through the eye circle snugly, do not pull too tightly or you can make an unwanted indentation into the head that cannot be undone unless you pull out all of the eye embroidery. Scroll back up to the Waldorf doll head with the yellow hair in the wig section of this tutorial.

Look at her eye screen left and you will be able to easily tell how pulling the embroidery thread too tightly can distort the face. Once you have the eyes situated to your liking, go to the top of the head one last time to tie off your embroidery string and trim away the excess. Yes, I know, breaking the rules is bad. Well, my decision to machine embroider an eye onto the doll skin head covering before sewing it together worked just fine.

The eyes were a perfect circle and in the right spot, but the machine embroidery looked completely out of place with the hand embroidered mouth using floss and not thread, and basically took the sweet simple magic entirely out of the Waldorf process.

I hated the perfect eye and went right back to practicing how to hand embroider them better — forgiving myself for any slight imperfection the girls the dolls were given to, just did not even notice or care about anyway. Some folks prefer almond shaped or oblong eyes — both of which are easier to pull of. The love of oblong eyes is clearly evidenced by the very high price Bamboletta Waldorf dolls bring, and their ever-increasing popularity.

So far, the eyes I embroider are Bamboletta-ish without trying to be. The doll artist from the Ukraine and I happened to connect on a Waldorf doll Facebook page, and she kindly offered to video how she makes her eyes when creating her next doll and share it with me. So when I can make those type of eyes better I will definitely be updating this tutorial so I can pay her courtesy forward and share it with all of you, as well. Note, I placed the needle by the stick pin to highlight its placement.

DO NOT start the mouth embroidery from the front of the head. Mark what will be the corners of the mouth with stick pins to help you guide the doll making needle to the right spot when going from the back of the head to the front and bringing 1 strand of embroidery floss out to create the Waldorf doll mouth. You will need almost 10 inches of pink or red embroidery floss to complete the mouth on a doll head that is approximately 12 inches in diameter. While the mouth itself takes up little embroidery floss, pulling the floss from the back of the head through the front, back again, and then tying it off will probably use more embroidery floss than you think.

You can make the mouth using thread, but you will have to repeat the process multiple times for it to having any real depth. The problem with layering thread to create the mouth involves how easily the thinner thread can become loose or snap with regular play. Push the doll making needle with the floss through the back of the head and out through the face, right next to the push pin.

Insert your threaded doll making needle back into the face, getting as close to the other push pin as possible. Now, gently yet firmly, tug onto the starting and ending strands of mouth embroidery floss visible at the back of the head. This action will draw your mouth up into a smile. Pull the thread while watching the embroidery floss mouth move in position to avoid adding knotting each exposed end on the back of the head with a mouth drawn back either too tightly or too loosely.

The good part about the simple mouth embroidery is that correcting a mistake is both quick and easy. Simply snip the knotted ends and pull out the single strand of embroidery floss is the Waldorf mouth result is not initially to your liking.

There several ways to make a Waldorf doll wig — and copious amounts of fairly simple and cute hairstyles to choose from. I was initially a bit intimidated about wig making, nearly as much as I was about learning how to make the doll head.

Many wig making tutorials and kits involved using a skull cap and crochet needles. I have absolutely no idea how to do anything crochet-related, and honestly, no real desire to learn.

I spent a few hours over the course of several weeks searching for and watching Waldorf doll hair and wig making tutorials, and eventually combined several of those techniques into something that worked for me, and held up under young child play. My version of curling yarn is slightly different because I streamlined the process slightly, and am thrilled with the consistent results. The dowels I used were about 12 inches long. They will be going into your oven yes, oven, that was not a typo so just make sure you cut down any dowels that will not allow your door to nearly close.

Make sure to wrap the yarn as tightly as possible — like Waldorf doll head core level of tight. Your hands will probably ache by the time you are done wrapping enough yarn for a wig or two — I tossed the dowels and pencils on the table and volunteered three family members to help, and the process still took a little over an hour.

During that session we wrapped enough yarn for four 12 inch in diameter doll heads. It takes about 10 to 12 dowel rods to make enough hair for the doll you are making in this Waldorf tutorial.

Put a large pot of water on the stove to boil, and preheat your oven to a low heat setting. I used degrees. Keep the door propped open just slightly so you will be alerted if the yarn becomes too hot and starts to become a fire concern, and to increase air ventilation. I have never once had a problem putting the damp yarn in the oven as long as I leave the oven door open for a little extra ventilation.

Remove the yarn covered dowels and pencils from the oven in about 10 minutes — or when they are dry to the touch. Once the yarn has again cooled enough to touch, begin unwinding each dowel and pencil to stare in pure glee at your curly Waldorf doll wig in the making. Mohair yarns tend to curl the best, but I have had great results with every type of natural yarn that I have tried.

Lay your yarn out flat, and then double the length you want the hair to be on your Waldorf doll before cutting. Repeat the first two steps until you have the thickness of hair for the Waldorf doll wig that you desire. Cut a strip of felt, doll skin fabric or other natural fabric that will blend in with the yarn hair and skin tone. The piece of felt et al should be a minimum of two inches wide, and long enough to go from the forehead down the back of the head to the hair line on the doll.

Do not worry about how wide the strip is at this point, once the yarn is attached it will be trimmed down. The wider the strip the easier it will be to balance out the yarn evenly and keep it situated in place. I typically use a full sheet of felt, and then trim away the excess and use the scrap when making tiny dollhouse Waldorf dolls, or in other projects when a little bit of felt is all that is needed.

Once you have a single layer placed on the strip, add a second layer so the Waldorf doll wig will be fuller. If you are adding some fun colored or textured yarn into the wig for highlights, I recommend hand sewing them onto the wig after it has been attached to the head.

It is simply too hard to determine placement for a select few adornment strands at this phase of the doll wig making process. Resist the temptation to add more than two layers of yarn to the scalp strip — or prepare to have a tangled mess that will likely induce both cursing and scissors grabbing to dislodge your scalp strip from where it was sucked down into the bobbin carriage. Once you place the scalp strip with yarn onto the sewing machine you will likely need to smooth out the yarn again because it is nearly impossible to keep it from shifting until it is sewn into place.

If you want the Waldorf doll to have a side part instead of a center part, adjust the yarn accordingly before sewing it into place. Trim away the excess scalp strip. Position the scalp strip with the yarn attached onto the head. Make sure it covers the nubs of knots left from making the eyes and mouth, lays as flush as possible, and is centered on the head.

Use the doll making needle or upholstery needle which is the one I prefer for this step and hand sew the scalp strip into place. I do not recommend using embroidery floss for sewing on the scalp because it will stand out way too much on a finished Waldorf doll.

Randomly hand sew around the head affixing the first layer of yarn near the top of the strand only to the head to anchor the wig down, using embroidery thread.