Toys

Paper doll

Paper dolls were sold by the sheet at newspaper stalls and corner shops: one doll standing straight and a few dresses, shirts and shoes, each with little white tabs along the edges. You cut them out with mum's small scissors, slowly, so you didn't snip off a tab by mistake.

Changing clothes meant folding the tabs behind the doll's back. A group of friends laid a row of dolls on the tiled floor, each running a tailor's shop, and played until evening. Then everything went between the pages of a thick book, still perfect a year later, only every tab a little worn.

Do you remember? Do you still have a paper doll pressed inside some old book?

💬 Everyone's memories

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