Upcycled Bradley Doll with Pink Dyed Hair

24 January

Back in 2021, I found an old Bradley doll at the thrift store and I gave her a fun makeover.

I had so much fun with that project that I've been on the hunt for another Bradley doll to update and guess what?!

I finally found one!

You can see the first doll here: Upcycled Bradley Doll

Upcycled Bradley Doll with Pink Dyed Hair

That first doll was in much better shape than this one.

You can see that this one has a dirty face and clothes, her hair is damaged, and her legs were broken in several places.

This little girl's hair was really jacked up.

I removed her dirty, dated dress first.

Since her hair was in such bad shape, I decided to try dyeing it. I read several tutorials online but most involved hair that had been removed from the doll. I could not get her hair off without damaging it further so I decided to try a technique using Sharpie pens.

I chose baby pink which turned out a pretty strawberry blond color.

These are her original pigtails which had basically fallen off. I combed them out and put them together to create a bun to cover the glue that was left from where her hat was attached to the top of her head.

I gave her some little pin curls with the flyaway hairs by wetting the hair and wrapping it around pipe cleaners until it dried.

Here she is with her new pink hairdo 😊

Now I needed to get the dirt off her face. Bradley dolls are just molded styrofoam covered with nylon so an old toothbrush and regular dish soap worked great!

I repaired her legs the best I could, but since they were so badly damaged, I decided she needed a pair of pants instead of a dress.

I made her pants from some fun retro fabric I had.

I made her top from a sweater sleeve that was left over from the DIY Christmas Tree Skirt From Thrifted Sweaters.

And then I gave her some tattoos just like I did on the other Bradley doll. (I added a necklace later to hide the leftover bits of the old beads that were there).

I use this translucent scarf to make tattoos.

Finally, I gave her plain white plastic stand an update too.

And here she is!!

I used some of the tulle from her old outfit under her shirt, around her waist.

Her little friend is a needle-felted bunny that I made several years ago.

I made her choker from a tiny piece of rhinestone chain, black ribbon, and a heart charm. Her blouse buttons are pins in colors that match her pants.

She has a full tattoo sleeve.

I reused her old millinery flowers that were on her hat and added a few newer ones to fill in around her bun.

I think she looks so much better with her updated style, what do you think? I'm on the hunt for another doll now, I want to create a Frida Kahlo version.

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