Ariane Aimee - Customiser of Cuties

Meet Ariane Aimee, a doll customiser who specialises in creating seriously cute custom dolls made from Monster High, Ever After High and Shoppie doll bases.

We started following Ariane on Instagram after falling in love with her customised Tigerlily Shopkins and an anime-style red riding hood doll. So we wanted to learn more about her and wanted to showcase her work on our blog.

Ariane is 23 years old, and has only started doll customising since October 2018. I asked her what has got her into customising.

"I have always loved toys and cute things, and I have been an artist, since I was a kid. I love creating things that you can display and play with, so it felt natural to try and do this kind of thing. I have been watching doll custom videos for a long time now, probably since 2014.

I found Andreja Tutorials or Nicolle Dreams on Deviantart, which led to me finding her YouTube channel and watching just about every video on there. I was intimidated at first because she had such a delicate touch with her dolls, plus she had years and years of experience, with lots of expensive tools.

Eventually I found Dollightful, who has now made a big name for herself in the doll community. I think her nerdy style dolls, as well as her using simpler materials really opened the world of doll customising up for me. Now I just love it; I love how delicate the features are and how you can turn a factory made doll into a one of a kind piece that feels alive." 

So what is her favourite doll mould to work with?

"I love Lagoona Blue's mould, her fishy features are really cute, but they also lend themselves well to a fantasy elf vibe so I find her face very versatile. Other than hers I love Frankie Stein because she has such a cute face;l her jawline is pretty unique since it is so square and the mint colour goes well with pastels. 

However, I love Ever After High face moulds because the lack of set eye shape in the mould really gives me some freedom with eye shape, and the rounder face shape is more youthful and cute than most monster high dolls."

Doll customising is quite an undertaking, due to the unbelievable details and layering of colours on the face paint (face-up), the wig making and costuming. Ariane says making a custom can take her up to 2 weeks; with the face up usually 2-3 days, though sometimes she can finish it in a day if all goes well.

Ariane says re-rooting doll hair and wig-making takes several days, and costumes can take up to a week depending on the complexities. However she may find something suitable in her stockpiles and put together a new costume with factory clothing and the hair they came with.

Whilst much of Ariane's work on Instagram has the cute/bishojou style, Ariane is keen to start working on fairy themes as she has always adored fairies as a young child. "I don't know why but something about them just makes me so happy, but I generally love all fantasy creatures. I think it's such a fun genre to create art from because it's unlimited inspiration," she says. Well Ariane, when you start making some fairies we would love to see some photos please!

Given so much scope to create such beautiful things, I've wondered whether doll customisers keep a collection of their own work or store bought dolls. Ariane says she doesn't have a huge collection.

"Even though I have always liked the dolls I was never motivated to start collecting until recently. I have around seven dolls now that are mine permanently, including one ball jointed doll which I got recently! Getting a ball jointed doll was the big goal for me since I appreciate the art and design of BJDs (ball jointed dolls) and actually want to try making one myself." Wow Ariane, that sounds difficult and a feat of engineering indeed.

As a tip for those wanting to try doll customising, she says practice is the most important thing as well as learning to drawing faces in digital or traditional media gives a good understanding of faces and facial structures. She says to keep trying and practicing as you get better at it each time.

Ariane sells her dolls on Etsy and Instagram, and here are her links: https://www.etsy.com/au/shop/arianamiidolls

Instagram @arianamiidolls

Ariane mainly sells her dolls on Instagram and you can message her directly on Instagram if you are interested in the ones for sale.