On 4th November 2012, I wrote and published a post about Sindy Styling heads which I have since reverted back to draft form, the information in this post was part of that one but looking back through my "Drafts Folder" I realise it really should be two separate posts, so I have decided to split and rewrite them both...
It began when I discovered a Sindy Doll bust online and wanted to find out more about them...
Around the same time I managed to get my hands on a bundle of Sindy dolls, which I was either going to restore or customise depending on how damage they were when they arrived.
At the time I bought them I was curious about the one that appeared to have purple hair and when she arrived I was even more curious about her, so I uploaded a photo of her to my Flickr Photostream and asked my Flickr friends for any information on her.
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One of my friends suggested that she is probably a Quick Change Sindy which came with pens so you could add streaks of colour to their hair or if you prefer completely change the colour of her hair.
I couldn't resist bidding on it and while waiting for the auction to end, I began researching these instead!
I discovered there are two versions of this toy, a standard (for this type of toy) "Flesh tone" part bust (shoulders really) version and one that has the bust area (partial breast lumps included!) made from red textured plastic... possibly to resemble a jumper, as shown in the photo' below.
I have no idea why this version has a red textured body, I suspect it is made to simulate a red sweater as opposed to the flesh versions above.
I guess it is possible that as she is showing part of her breasts it was deemed more appropriate to have her "wearing" something.
One image I found appeared to be a brunette version of this "sweater" style styling head, which seems to be identical in every except for the hair.
I think this may infact be a case of someone not placing the original blonde head back on the bust as after discovering the origin of these "busts" / "mini styling heads" I can't really sree the point of making a dark haired version, that statement will become clear to you once you've read a bit further down...
As it doesn't enjoy being enlarged much, I guess I should explain it's relevance... At the bottom of the box there is an "Also available" type image which toy manufacturers just so love placing on their products, the product it's advertising is ( I don't actually know the marketed name ) an additional playset which contains a hair brush, mirror, comb, portable hair dryer, hair curlers, holders etc
I recently bought part of this set which you can see in the listing photograph below... Sadly it wasn't complete and the yellow items don't belong to it, but it did contain the long coveted Sindy Curlers I've been after for years and the adorable portable hair dryer too!
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The "Brunette with curlers" image above is looking more and more to me like a bundle of similar Sindy items that the seller has either knowingly or not, grouped together for the purpose of the sale.
And talking of auctions and more specifically the one for the "Flesh tone bust" / "Styling head" I mentioned earlier...
Well I didn't win that auction but after more searching I found a "red bust" blonde haired version for auction, I placed a bid and this time I won!
It wasn't until I received it that I discovered it's actually pretty small, the head itself is the same size as a regular Pedigree Sindy doll and in fact whole thing was the exact same size as a Sindy doll's shoulders as I discovered when I placed one on top of the other.
I still had no idea what I had got until several months later when I decided to once again search for information on Quick Change Sindy dolls by taking another look on Google Images - this time I got lucky and discovered several images of boxed "Quick Change Sindy" dolls...
One look at the boxed dolls and the mystery of the "Sweater" and flesh type heads was solved!!
As you can see from these two images, these dolls came with a spare head mounted on a mini bust, some boxes had the bust that with a flesh tone bust and some had the bust in a textured red plastic, there is probably some reason for this, but so far I have been unable to work out what it is.
My only guess is that they somehow correspond to the two variants of this doll available at the time; one wearing a purple sparkly outfit, as shown in the photos below and one wearing a silver outfit, they both had a metallic padded jacket as part of their outfit.
As you can see from the above photo and one below these busts seem to have been designed so that they can be displayed alongside Sindy's furniture in her Dream House or wherever else your doll may live.
My spare head is packed safely away in one of my many doll filled boxes and so apart from the photographs which were part of the Ebay listing and we're already uploaded as part of this post when I initially wrote and published it a few years back, so I haven't taken any new pictures of it for this post.
It began when I discovered a Sindy Doll bust online and wanted to find out more about them...
Around the same time I managed to get my hands on a bundle of Sindy dolls, which I was either going to restore or customise depending on how damage they were when they arrived.
.JPG)
As I'd never heard of her before I did a little research and discovered that she was released in 1982 and came with "Magic Colour Change Sticks" which were used to draw the colour or colours of your choice directly onto the doll's hair, whether or not these washed out I cannot say, although I suspect they would have done so you can try another colour or colour pattern etc.
(So really not much more than my friend told me, in fact it was virtually impossible to find anything else on this doll at all at that time...)
Which makes me think it's even more surprising that this doll of mine still has the colour on her hair - without which it would have been impossible to identify her as a Quick change Sindy!
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| Ebay Listing |
One of the tools I like to use when trying to identify dolls and other toys is Google Images. While originally looking for info' on various Sindy's in order to identify this girl, I spotted a thumbnail of the above image which lead me on what I initially thought was a separate quest to buy a Sindy Styling head.
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| Ebay Listing |
I couldn't resist bidding on it and while waiting for the auction to end, I began researching these instead!
I discovered there are two versions of this toy, a standard (for this type of toy) "Flesh tone" part bust (shoulders really) version and one that has the bust area (partial breast lumps included!) made from red textured plastic... possibly to resemble a jumper, as shown in the photo' below.
 |
| Ebay Listing |
I guess it is possible that as she is showing part of her breasts it was deemed more appropriate to have her "wearing" something.
One image I found appeared to be a brunette version of this "sweater" style styling head, which seems to be identical in every except for the hair.
I think this may infact be a case of someone not placing the original blonde head back on the bust as after discovering the origin of these "busts" / "mini styling heads" I can't really sree the point of making a dark haired version, that statement will become clear to you once you've read a bit further down...
As you can see from this picture of the "Brunette version", these "Sweater" styling heads came with heated hair curlers so you could heat-set and style Sindy's hair, I am unsure whether the "Flesh" type
also had this gimmick.
Or so I thought but while double checking my facts and editing this post from the original (written in 2012) today, I did a bit more research I found this image in Google:
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| https://www.flickr.com/photos/lauralovelylocks/8213184369/ |
I recently bought part of this set which you can see in the listing photograph below... Sadly it wasn't complete and the yellow items don't belong to it, but it did contain the long coveted Sindy Curlers I've been after for years and the adorable portable hair dryer too!
.JPG)
The "Brunette with curlers" image above is looking more and more to me like a bundle of similar Sindy items that the seller has either knowingly or not, grouped together for the purpose of the sale.
And talking of auctions and more specifically the one for the "Flesh tone bust" / "Styling head" I mentioned earlier...
Well I didn't win that auction but after more searching I found a "red bust" blonde haired version for auction, I placed a bid and this time I won!
It wasn't until I received it that I discovered it's actually pretty small, the head itself is the same size as a regular Pedigree Sindy doll and in fact whole thing was the exact same size as a Sindy doll's shoulders as I discovered when I placed one on top of the other.
I still had no idea what I had got until several months later when I decided to once again search for information on Quick Change Sindy dolls by taking another look on Google Images - this time I got lucky and discovered several images of boxed "Quick Change Sindy" dolls...
One look at the boxed dolls and the mystery of the "Sweater" and flesh type heads was solved!!
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| Google Images |
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| Google Images |
My only guess is that they somehow correspond to the two variants of this doll available at the time; one wearing a purple sparkly outfit, as shown in the photos below and one wearing a silver outfit, they both had a metallic padded jacket as part of their outfit.
 |
| Photo found on Google - If it belongs to you, please let me know so I can credit you. |
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| Image found on Google, please contact for credit if it belongs to you. |
I have however found this photograph, also taken several years back, which shows how my Quick Change Sindy looks now...
I was worried that if I wetted her hair to restyle it she may lose the purple streaks, which really is all that's left of her original "played with" look and something she has been displaying for the last 33 years!
It really didn't seem right to remove it - I'm not a "Purest Doll Collector" well not totally - I can and often am swayed, afterall it's not really a good trait to have when customising dolls that are Vintage or Limited Edition etc
But I digress ...
It seemed a great opportunity for me to experiment with 1/6 clothes and one set in particular which I'd had my eye on for a while - so I brushed out her tangles, redressed her in said outfit and...
Punky Sindy was born!
Punky Sindy is such a cutie!!
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