oll makers had been trying to create a lifelike doll for hundreds of years. Blow moulding allowed them to produce plastic bodies that were light and made excellent jointed dolls, to which seamless vinyl heads shaped by rotational moulding were added. In the late fifties, it became the most popular method of making dolls.

In the blow moulding process, vinyl paste was poured into a two-piece mould through a tube. Air was blown into the mould, forcing the paste against the sides and heating it quickly to solidify it. The mould was then opened, and the piece, usually an arm or a leg, was removed by hand.

In vinyl, doll makers at last had a material that was warm, soft to the touch, and easy to mould, colour and add hair to. Moreover, once the required machinery was installed, the dolls were inexpensive to produce. Earlier problems with vinyl discolouring had been overcome by the sixties, when some of the finest vinyl dolls were made.