Decadence by Marc Jacobs and Vetiverus by Oliver & Co.!!! With confidence. :> Thanks to my fiance, he's really into perfume and got a lot of free samples emailing some some indie perfumists and going to high end stores. The infamous Angel by Thierry Mugler got him into it. Lol
I feel so sad for lilys creator..he had his entire career taken away due to blatent theft , it being twisted into “lily was a sex doll” too just makes it sadder
Doesn't it make you furious?😥 Everything about Barbie's "creation" makes me sick. Mattel pretty much ruined that whole man's life stealing from him. And to add insult to injury, they didn't even TRY to make her look different either. They just updated Lilli's clothes and ponytail. It truly does break my heart thinking about how that poor man suffered because Mattel didn't want to try designing their own lady doll from scratch.
@@sissysovereign1294 exctaly. I know the video isnt aiming to make people hate barbie but its really hard to see barbie is a super postive light now knowing how she was nothing more then a product stolen from a small german company
@@sissysovereign1294 Worst of all, Mattel lied to Mr. Hausser that they sold few quantities so that they would already give them Lilli's patents. In an interview before his death in 2010, he explained that there was a lot of miscommunication on both sides because of their different languages. The factory is now a night bar and I really feel so sad for him since he died very bitter. Mr. Hausser, Mr. Beutien, Mr. Max Weissbrodt and Mrs. Martha Maar they are totally left out in the Barbie story.
@@crystalbae0909 how ironic is it that later one mattel would sue hasbro’s sindy for allegedly “stealing barbies face”-meanwhile barbies entire being is stolen from lily
I heard that a lot of people gave these dolls for their kids to play with, not taking her being a "novelty toy" into account at all. She literally was the first fashion doll and it's sad to see she gets none of the credit for it.
I could see little girls admiring the character though, even if the comics are intended for adults. I admired sexy women I saw on TV and in movies when I was a kid.
When you think about it, it is very sad how Bild Lillie was plagerized. Granted, without her or Barbie, we'd never have any of the popular doll brands that we know today. But no matter how many times I hear the tale of Barbie's ancestor,I can't help but feel for Lilli's creator. Having his brain child taken from under his nose without his permission and given an American makeover must've felt like a real slap in the face to him. Taking inspiration is one thing, but there really is no getting around how OG barbie was just a copy and paste of Lilli with more curls in her ponytail. If only he had gotten some sort of royalties for Barbie or something.
its really depressing...and the story of nearly every modern fictional character in the current zeitgeist. theyre all stolen from the artists - cabbage patch kids, batman, barbie, nearly everyone popular in dc and marvel comics. american companies have a history of copyrighting intellectual property from poor artists, but so does japan! the kewpie design being an example.
@@NIGHTGUYRYAN That truly is depressing seeing how many artists and toymakers were robbed of their creations. It's even more sad how half of them are still alive today and forced to see their creations being handled against their wishes and not being able to do a thing about it. The business world truly is riddled with shady people.
With the exception of the goal to marry a rich man though. That was only a thing in the one 80s movie. But then she had to work two jobs to survive, soitw was understandable.
kinda weird that the english-speaking internet cannot fathom Lilli being an entirely safe for work sexy, flirty, illustrated icon when literally we've had Betty Boop since the 20's and she's still a fairly big pop culture icon to this day. This is nothing new or foreign.
The netflix "Toys that made Us" barbie episode was so disapointing to me(I wanted to learn about the actual doll itself not having a sex or plastic surgey joke every 5 minutes while undermining the cultural aspect that went into it). Glad to see that spite put to make this video. A much better history video of Bild Lili that she deversed!
I heard many people disappointed in the show to how it treated star trek, and how it supposedly over exaggerated eastman and laird's spit up, acting like it was bad blood when the 2 are still on good terms
Omg, I felt the same way when I watched that episode! What's even worse is I would have had no idea how inaccurate it was if not for this channel. It made me so mad with the misogyny and whorephobia she's described with.
The truth is that there are many things that they have not mentioned, I felt that the episode of My Little Pony and Hello Kitty was more complete than Barbie, I feel that they did not want to reveal more negative things that Mattel has done.
I know right!? She doesn't even look like a sex doll. All she have was adult comics that weren't even that too sexual to begin with as some porno, and then some millennial parents think they have the right assumption to say "Oh, she's a street prostitute as seen in this comic that *BARELY* shows any of her sexual intentions! And let's assume that Lili is a sex doll even though she's literally a *small* figurine made to please children since that's what a fashion doll is-" just shut the fvck up! My God. The fact that those folks only did that just to make barbie look bad just made them look like they want attention thanks to those articles that they've created is just very annoying, especially for lilli. The girl was a damn detective in her own movie, and yet they still think she's made for sex & pleasures, as if she was the only product of her time. I can't even at this point-
I had no idea that her legacy was so sad even as a german. I never knew about her up until recently. It's sad how much we forgot about her. And also, the fact that a big company like Mattel could just steal someone's character and leave them with no chance of defending themselves just shows how copyright never favors the small and poor artists. It is incredibly sad really.
as someone who speaks german fluently, i thought i’d translate some things i saw in the vid that where not translated:) 9:46 it says that the people in her office should be glad that she’s still in the office on time, even tho there is a traditional holiday going on, where most people dress up in costumes. 9:57 she makes a joke about being late to work. 10:03 she (probably, not rly sure about the context on this one) makes fun of her colleague by saying “if you get payed how much you are actually worth, how tf do you survive? 10:14 her saying her bf will buy her this fur coat for christmas, he just doesn’t know about it yet. so honestly, she’s an icon.
She sounds very self confident and sassy. The kind of woman who would slap a man for sexually harassing her rather than tremble and cry and then lawsuit. Really, a better role model than Barbie for young ladies.
@@SewingBoxDesignsI'm so glad watching Barbie reviews about finding out about her. 💜 I don't care about the gold digging, but I do like Lilli a little more than Barbie. She is NOT a pushover.
Omg I've actually had this conversation before. Someone I used to be friends with in middle school had a baby about 10ish years ago and suddenly morphed into one of those Facebook moms, you know the ones, and kept sharing outrage bait articles about the origins of barbie. I finally got sick of seeing them and basically said "how tf is lilli a sex doll, she's like 10 inches tall and made of hard plastic". She didn't like me challenging her 😂
I'd think if Bild Lilli dolls were supposed to be strictly sexual there'd be one molded to look like the pannel where she only has a tiny towel covering the front of her torso with a removable towel accessory. I've seen Betty Boop merch saucier than Lilli dolls
It's so weird that Lilli is so often called a "sex doll" when there's a huge market for pinup style figurines right here in the modern day. That seems like the obvious comparison to me. Fans of different comics and cartoons and such will happily buy small plastic representations of their favorite cute fictional girls, but give her swappable outfits and suddenly that's weird, I guess.
its a doll for gay men, haha. she's camp, its great. but yeah, its gross how mattel hasnt addressed this glaring stain on barbies backstory. just pay the artist or his estate and move on with proper credit given. we can easily look this info up. it makes mattel look bad unfortunately.
she absolutely served cvunt but labeling her a ‘doll for gay men’ is still perpetuating the stereotype that all gay men are effeminate and like stereotypically ‘feminine’ things, and you’re still connecting the doll to sexuality in a way not it imo
Tbh Bild Lilli reminds me of waifu figures. Rolf Hausser's description of her and the fact that a lot of the art you showed is basically just cartoon pinups make her feel like a proto anime waifu lol
There is an artist by the name of julian kalinowski. He makes Bild Lilli reproduction dolls called Lilli Lanka . He also do repros of Barbie and other vintage dolls. He does amazing work.
OMG, Thank goodness you made this video! I've been having arguments of Barbie's origin, and the nature of the "Bild Lilli" Comics for monthes with a close friend of mine who refrenced the often ostentatious headlines of the articles of Lilli. As someone who can understand German, i fail to see the risqué nature of Lilli who was more of a independent, attractive woman who had boyfriends, lived alone and had jobs. yeah, a lot of the humor was based of double entendre and word play, and she was far from the wholesome Barbie we have today, but she's barely a sexual figure when you consider that actual contents of the comics, which where more based of her revolving series of careers, her difficulties in finding a long-term partner, and how she was sexualized by onlookers, while doing something as mundane as walking down the street or going out for a swim.
This doll was made as a fun collectable for people who were "in the know", like pop vinyl figure, not as a sex object. I think the story in magazines (I know a bit of german) is okay and dosen't shame females in any way - it was even progressive from my perspective.
Lilli reminds me of a Hungarian comic strip character called Jucika. They had somewhat similar personalities with the main difference in their comics being that Jucika's were 3 panels long and usually had no dialog.
This is an obscure fact that I'm guessing most of you don't know, but several years before both Barbie and Bild hit the market, there was a short lived line of fashion dolls produced in Argentina, that very much set the basis for those two. These dolls were a part of the "Chicas Divito" line, inspired by the pinup illustrations from argentinian comic artist Divito. His female characters were a huge success at the time, because of their voluptuous, exaggerated features, very much in tune with what Jessica Rabbit would eventually become in the future. Because of how popular his pinup girls were, a line of fashion dolls targetted towards the male audience were released, based on his designs. They were available as blonde and brunette, and had bathing suits. There is only one image available of the blonde version of the doll, in black and white. So, there was a "sexy" blonde doll in South America already making noise, long before Bild and Barbie met the audience. And I only found about it just recently! .
@@SewingBoxDesigns Argentina's population is mostly italian and spanish descent. Not a lot of red-heads here, so the dolls represented the local demographic, kind of. Divito did draw lots of diverse pin-ups however. He would regularly draw red-heads and black women too. But the doll line only reflected the most common kind of women of the country, I guess.
@@mwa9896 Es que no quedaron copias disponibles, y casi no hay fotos promocionales. En internet al menos encontré una sola imagen, y no de la muñeca en si, si no más bien de una publicidad en un diario, con una foto de la muñeca en blanco y negro. Eran muy Jessica Rabbit, voluptuosas y exageradas en las proporciones.
I'm German and before discovering Darling Dollz, I didn‘t even know of Lilli and her history. I mean I'm not part of the doll community and that might be why, but I promise most people my age (born around the 90s) won‘t have a clue either and would be REALLY surprised to hear that a small German toy company inspired the famous Barbie. All of her history and the bad reputation she gets make me really sad… and it’s a bit infuriating too… so thank you for defending Lilli on Twitter. Fun fact, the Bild paper is - at least today in modern times - known for being pretty bad Yellow Press that uses dumb, shocking or/and distasteful headlines to gain attention and similar shenanigans. So when I first heard THEY published the Lilli comics I was pretty worried, but more than anything, they look really charming. They have a cute and witty tone and overall are… just really harmless. I‘m baffled why she and her doll would get international treatment like that. (interestingly though, those headlines shown by Darling Dollz in the video are EXACTLY the kind of news you would expect the Bild to publish! Maybe Karma just comes around… But Lilli and her creator definitely deserved so much better…) Thank you for the video.
Personaly as a german I do remember going thrue old stuff from my mother and even grand mithers toys and finding some of the Lilli caricatures! She was hilarious and most definetly child friendly!!! I have to addmitt (ofc bc that wasn't my time and when I still played with dolls new ones were out!) But I personaly always cared for her original story and the commics. Didn't even knew about the whole toy company drama and obvi as a child didn't care. I have to addmit that I would be happy if Mattel atleast gives some homage or credit to the original comics! Like idk barby talking about her grandma and its prettymuch a tie to the old storys.
Thank you so much for this video! As someone who speaks German, I always have to roll my eyes when I see people parroting that stupid misconception about Lilli's occupation. Now I finally have the right material to show if someone still keeps insisting that my sweet Mädel is an escort! Vielen Dank ❤
it seems like the real dark truth was the integrity of ruth handler. its just another example of how life isnt fair . you can have a billion dollar idea and someone can steal that and reap the rewards . facsinating. great video.
As a comics/dolls cross over fan, I'm really glad in recent years people have brought the facts about Lili and her history to light. She's a very interesting character and deserves more recognition
because I haven’t seen anyone else translate the shown comic strips: 9:51 “you should rather give me a word of recognition, because I’m on time even though it’s carnival” (also, why she’s dressed like that) 9:58 “what, only 10 past 8? I haven’t come this early too late” 10:05 “your boss pays you by your word? Well, can you live by that-?” 11:58 “I myself would rather wait a little bit with eating - because I gathered the mushrooms myself” 12:03 “the best birthday present to you would be a kiss? Dang/sad - now I already bought you a necktie!” (I can’t read the one with four panels at once, sorry) 20:47 “wasn’t it awful to be a bachelor - in smoky pubs and cold beer as a drink?” Also, the Bild “newspaper” is at least nowadays very famous for being an awful newspaper. They always print headlines that aren’t quite true, have bad journalism and used to print naked women as a selling point
amazing video thank you so much. I always had an impression Ruth Handler walked by some messy or eclectic storefront and the Build Lilli was laying there, a one-off knickknack sleazy sex toy diamond in the rough waiting to be reimagined... and I am one of the people who needed to be called out for repeating this! So thrilled to learn she was actually a charismatic and glam cartoon... love your videos
shes so much cuter than barbie tbh. barbie had poodle bangs and her first mold was kinda busted in the face. eventually ruth was able finesse an acceptable copy, but bild lilli is beautifully designed and painted in both doll and comic form.
As a German, your pronunciation is quite good! If I had to nitpick, I would say that the way you pronounced Zeitung well, but the stress is on the first syllable. ZEI-tung, not Zeit-TUNG. But that's nitpicking because you asked people to correct you. You're doing great and I enjoyed the video! 9:45 is basically "You should thank me that I'm punctual even though it's carnival.", explaining her revealing outfit. 10:03 is my favourite, her asking the man "Your boss pays you by your worth? Can you even live off that (salary)?"
This was really fascinating! Poor Lilli but honestly the socio/econimic/political history and influence of dolls always is fascinating and feels weird. "They're just toys" Okay, yes. But also, that effects a LOT. It's really interesting.
Now we can truly give credit for the first fashion doll and her creator! Darling, please please make a vid similar to this talking about history of Licca Chan!
I am so glad that you are pushing back on the idea of Lili being a "call girl", etc. This is a drum I've been banging for years and it's likely you came across my work on this topic when researching your video. It is an absolute disservice to society at large to continue to parrot Bild's opinions on women. It's shocking to see people who claim to appreciate plastic women (Barbie) be so disrespectful of the real women Bild insult on the daily.
Even though Lilli and the first gen Barbie have striking similarities, Lilli looks a bit more “chic”. I think it’s her thinly high-arched eyebrows, more narrow side-gaze, and tighter ponytail. I can see her being the more mature, in her 20’s “Barbie”, since Barbie herself is supposed to be a teenager. Barbie is apple pie; Lilli is rich cheesecake.
So what you're telling me is that Lilli was Madonna's character in the Material Girl music video (when she's getting jewels off all the guys on the stairs)
Somebody else has probably already translated these, but... anyways... 9:48 „You should really appreciate that I’m still on time even though it’s Fasching!“ (meaning, instead of criticizing her outfit he should be happy that she’s there even though everybody else is out there on the street celebrating in costumes) 10:05 „Your boss pays you for what you’re worth? And that’s enough money for your living?“ 10:16 „My boyfriend is going to gift this fur coat to me on Christmas, he just doesn’t know it yet.“
Thank you for sharing the truth. I've known this for awhile and it always frustrated me that people believed the lie Ruth and Mattel gave to the public. Bild lilli deserves credit for giving us the beginning of a true fashion doll. 💕
Because of your channel, I have become quite passionate in wanting to set the record straight about Lilli and how she's the origin of Barbie. So watching this video was such a treat! I will absolutely be sending it to friends who enjoy hearing about my love of fashion dolls.
Lili was more of a gold digger than a call girl. The doll would be more like official merchandise for fans of the comic character than a “sex toy”. The character of Bild Lilli was exclusively found in the newspaper she first appeared in, and so she would have been thought of as a mascot for the newspaper. The doll would probably have been used to promote the newspaper since she came with a little replica of the newspaper. Bild Lilli’s comic strip series was only written and drawn for one tabloid newspaper in Germany, so her legal copyright was probably exclusive to that particular German newspaper, unlike the comic strip intellectual properties that appear in American newspapers which are owned by corporate syndicates who sell the strips to multiple newspapers. If her comic strip was owned by a bigger and stronger corporate syndicate or a comic book company like DC Comics who would sell to multiple newspapers, she probably would have had more success in fighting off Mattel’s intellectual property theft. That’s probably just how corporate business and intellectual property worked back then. Global copyright laws were either too weak in the 1950s/1960s or Hauser just didn’t pick the right kind of legal fight against Mattel by going after the leg joint patent when he should have defended the comic strip character’s intellectual property. The Bild Zeitung newspaper and the original creator of the comic character should have also joined in the legal battle to defend the intellectual property of Bild Lilli.
This deep dive into Bild Lilli was really fascinating. Thank you. I knew about Bild Lilli, but not very much other than she was a German novelty doll based on a comic strip.
It’s strange how people demonize and shame someone and or something who is Sex positive! Lili needs a reboot! I’d kill to see whoever owns the rights do a adults collectors addition of Lili! 💚
i think it’s less demonizing sex positivity and more a backlash against the oversexualization of women in western culture. i feel that’s an important subject, especially when it comes to toys for young girls.
@@vila777_ on that subject, yes! But also on that note! J.I-Joe is next! His toxic masculinity and unrealistic body is clearly unhealthy for the minds of children. I wasn’t making a joke btw, I’m dead serious! 😂👏🏻 when it comes to toys for kids I love how Mattel has shaped its new form to fit everyone. But Lillie was intended for an adult audience and think Mattles “Adult collectors addition” should honor its roots and do a reboot of Lillie for its adult audience! 👍🏻
Lilli and her creator really got done so dirty :( Love the movie poster tbh it says a lot about what she was really supposed to be. it says roughly "Millions to get to know, millions to love, millions of experiences" (my german might be a little rusty sadly)
Been thinking about it and I think that in the ideal world people’s takeaway from Lili should have been „the original fashion doll that inspired Barbie was aimed at adult men, so it shouldn’t be considered weird or unmanly for boys to want to play with dolls”. But instead we got the „sex doll” misconception, because of course.
Feels like Mattel made up the paper doll part. And even if they didn’t, it’s not really relevant as it’s obvious Barbie is Lilli. Insane to know the fashion doll industry has been f’d up all along
McCalls was the one that had paper dolls and wasn’t the only one. They made a little girl doll that was fashionable before Barbie named Betsey McCalls.
oh please, barbie is riding on stolen valor. bild lilli is the true unsung fashion doll, barbie is an ever devolving corporate knock off with zero soul.
I feel like Netflix should take that Barbie episode down there's a lot of wrong information there. Also thanks for making this video because I didn't know much about Bild Lilli
Fantastic video. Anyone that takes the time to actually look up some Bild Lilli comics would see how light hearted it was! Even the wholesome Jucika could get spicier than that. Lilli actually reminds me more of a Mae West character, maybe crossed with Playboy's Femlin. Keep up the great videos 🩷🩷🩷🩷
I think you forgot one funny information in the begining of the Lilli's story. After the idea of a Baby was rejected, the cartonist decided to kept the baby head but draw her a grown woman body. What result with Lilli a grown woman with the really round and delicate face of a baby. And the barbie doll obviously still had this baby head on the first years.
It is interesting to see who LIlli really was, and as to theft of the doll, well I can't help put wonder about many dolls today which are very similar to each other but are from different brands. I don't think Ruth was intentionally thinking of destroying this man's career. She was just using Lilli as inspiration. It is sad that he wasn't able to make a new path for himself when all of this happened or think of another inspiring doll though. Anyhooo, I enjoyed learning more about LIlli and I hope this video helps clear her name :)(
I had heard about the origins of Barbie's "inspiration" before, but it was only recently that I saw a video from a doll show of a Bild Lilli. I had to look twice to see it wasn't an original-style Barbie. Ruth Handler and Mattel did Lilli and her creator dirty! Hopefully things would be different today.
this is so well researched and brings to light a topic that I hadn’t ever heard about besides those gossip web articles you pointed out, and this is incredibly put together. the amount of time and research and digging this must’ve taken I can only imagine, and btw your German pronunciation is not bad!! it’s a difficult language and you did good!! I love this video, it’s super interesting!
Quote from German VViki: "In the first year of sales (1955), the large dolls cost around DM 12.00 and the small ones around DM 7.50. At that time, office workers earned an average of 200 to 300 DM per month; this shows that the doll was by no means a cheap toy. Advertisements promoted it as an original gift for adults. In an advertisement from the 1960s, young men were suggested to give their girlfriend a BILD Lilli instead of flowers (Lilli commented on this to her boyfriend in a comic strip: "I thought it made so much sense that you gave me a Lilli doll the other day, now I have a suitable present for you too!" - with this she handed him a jumping jack)."
This was pretty fascinating to watch and learn the history about Barbie and where she was originally from. I heard her design was the Lily doll, but nothing more than that, and it’s honestly heartbreaking to hear. She was basically just stolen from a total different artist in Germany and he couldn’t do anything about it.
A similar story happened for American Girl doll's pleasant Rowland has an idea for a line of doll's after visit Williamsburg. She went to a store and saw the gotz doll's and went to Germany and asked and bought the doll's and got the okay to make the American Girl dolls in 1986 the 1st 3 dolls.were released then pleasant went to Germany and bought the addy facemold and bitty baby doll.facemolds I'm the 1990s. So for a long time, American Girl dolls were made in West Germany from the start of the company to then around the mid 90s. I don't know when doll's and iteams were made in China and Mattel bought American Girl in 1998 I believe.
Superbly told history of Lilli to whom we owe much respect, without her there would never have been Barbie. An original Lilli is worth a fortune today and it is so sad that her originator was never compensated by Mattel for stealing her likeness.
Lilli was published in a Finnish magazine in 60s. Yeah, she liked gifts and rich men, but nobody thought she was a prostitute. I doubt I saw Lilli doll once in the window of tobacco shop (another name for porno shop that time, even little children knew it). My mother wanted to go fast away that window - "it´s not a toy shop"
I was familiar with Lilli and Miss Seventeen. Ironically, back in the 60's I thought Miss Seventeen was a copy of Barbie because they looked so much alike but in reality Barbie is a clone of Miss Seventeen aka, Bild Lily. LOL I didn't learn this until I was an adult.
I found out about this years ago but after that I could only look at the Barbie founder with scorn. What gall to replicate the Lili doll 1:1 & commit what is essential intellectual property theft and then pretend it was modelled after your daughter. I wish this woman suffered repercussions for her actions but alas the world is not fair and the biggest thugs end up lining their pockets.
Jeez an american court ruled in favor of an american company. What a surprise. Pour Lilli never even had a fighting chance there. It's just sad, how they even tried/try to downplay it. Shady at best, something I'm too civilized to write down at worst.
I remember doing one of my final school assignments about toys over the years, and getting really frustrated when i was researching barbie. Normally i research in English because it has a big array of sources compared to my language. But for Lilli, everything i could find was different and only shared a weird point on Lilli being "a sex doll". Germany isn't my first language but my god did i do my best to research it in german instead 😭it's crazy how even today, english sources site Lilli to be nothing but a sex doll made for men when it really wasn't. It's sad to hear that the creators of the Lilli dolls basically had an awful life thanks to Mattel casually ripping her off for Barbie. Nothing against my girl Barbie but annoying how much Mattel nowadays downplays the event
I don't see Bild Lili as a "sex doll" or a "prostitute." I see her more as the kind of characters Marilyn Monroe sometimes played (specifically Lorelei in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes) only German.
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I feel so sad for lilys creator..he had his entire career taken away due to blatent theft , it being twisted into “lily was a sex doll” too just makes it sadder
Doesn't it make you furious?😥 Everything about Barbie's "creation" makes me sick. Mattel pretty much ruined that whole man's life stealing from him. And to add insult to injury, they didn't even TRY to make her look different either. They just updated Lilli's clothes and ponytail. It truly does break my heart thinking about how that poor man suffered because Mattel didn't want to try designing their own lady doll from scratch.
@@sissysovereign1294 exctaly. I know the video isnt aiming to make people hate barbie but its really hard to see barbie is a super postive light now knowing how she was nothing more then a product stolen from a small german company
I hundred percent agree with you too
@@sissysovereign1294 Worst of all, Mattel lied to Mr. Hausser that they sold few quantities so that they would already give them Lilli's patents. In an interview before his death in 2010, he explained that there was a lot of miscommunication on both sides because of their different languages. The factory is now a night bar and I really feel so sad for him since he died very bitter.
Mr. Hausser, Mr. Beutien, Mr. Max Weissbrodt and Mrs. Martha Maar they are totally left out in the Barbie story.
@@crystalbae0909 how ironic is it that later one mattel would sue hasbro’s sindy for allegedly “stealing barbies face”-meanwhile barbies entire being is stolen from lily
I heard that a lot of people gave these dolls for their kids to play with, not taking her being a "novelty toy" into account at all. She literally was the first fashion doll and it's sad to see she gets none of the credit for it.
She even came with a few accessories, such as a poodle as her pet and a scooter to drive.
I could see little girls admiring the character though, even if the comics are intended for adults. I admired sexy women I saw on TV and in movies when I was a kid.
When you think about it, it is very sad how Bild Lillie was plagerized. Granted, without her or Barbie, we'd never have any of the popular doll brands that we know today. But no matter how many times I hear the tale of Barbie's ancestor,I can't help but feel for Lilli's creator. Having his brain child taken from under his nose without his permission and given an American makeover must've felt like a real slap in the face to him. Taking inspiration is one thing, but there really is no getting around how OG barbie was just a copy and paste of Lilli with more curls in her ponytail. If only he had gotten some sort of royalties for Barbie or something.
THIS
FR!! I love barbie to death but we have to acknowledge that the original was a copy and the story behind the creator makes me mad as hell...
its really depressing...and the story of nearly every modern fictional character in the current zeitgeist. theyre all stolen from the artists - cabbage patch kids, batman, barbie, nearly everyone popular in dc and marvel comics. american companies have a history of copyrighting intellectual property from poor artists, but so does japan! the kewpie design being an example.
@@NIGHTGUYRYAN That truly is depressing seeing how many artists and toymakers were robbed of their creations. It's even more sad how half of them are still alive today and forced to see their creations being handled against their wishes and not being able to do a thing about it. The business world truly is riddled with shady people.
@@NIGHTGUYRYAN like how the Lion King is believed to have been taken from Kimba the White Lion
Finding a Bild Lilli doll is incredibly harder than an original 1st Barbie.
I have both the 12” and 7.5” Bild Lilli dolls and they were rather hard to find 😬 especially the 12” one
Yeah I wish we could get reproductions if Bild Lilli, but we know how hard Mattel would come down.
@@Writing4MySoul Yeah, they'd say you stole THEIR design.
Matttel own the rights to Lily so they should release some replicas. That guy was silly to sign the rights to Lily though.
@@Writing4MySoulmy mother makes bild lilli replicas! Look up Pania Cope Bild Lilli. It has been her lifes work 😄
She came off more like a Betty Boop character than anything else.
Yeah. When you think about it she basically was a German Betty Boop
With the exception of the goal to marry a rich man though. That was only a thing in the one 80s movie. But then she had to work two jobs to survive, soitw was understandable.
I guess, but Betty Boop is supposed to be 16, so at least Lili is an adult.
Kinda but I see them as 2 different characters they are so different but have some similarities.
betty boop has nothing on bild lilli.
kinda weird that the english-speaking internet cannot fathom Lilli being an entirely safe for work sexy, flirty, illustrated icon when literally we've had Betty Boop since the 20's and she's still a fairly big pop culture icon to this day. This is nothing new or foreign.
Us women are sexual creatures! God forbid!
The netflix "Toys that made Us" barbie episode was so disapointing to me(I wanted to learn about the actual doll itself not having a sex or plastic surgey joke every 5 minutes while undermining the cultural aspect that went into it). Glad to see that spite put to make this video. A much better history video of Bild Lili that she deversed!
As a toy nerd most of that Netflix series is bogus honestly, so many episodes were blatantly untrue.
I heard many people disappointed in the show to how it treated star trek, and how it supposedly over exaggerated eastman and laird's spit up, acting like it was bad blood when the 2 are still on good terms
Omg, I felt the same way when I watched that episode! What's even worse is I would have had no idea how inaccurate it was if not for this channel. It made me so mad with the misogyny and whorephobia she's described with.
@@Jhud69 another example : i was disappointed that the documentry spoke of Action Man without including the last dolls from the early 2000's.
The truth is that there are many things that they have not mentioned, I felt that the episode of My Little Pony and Hello Kitty was more complete than Barbie, I feel that they did not want to reveal more negative things that Mattel has done.
Bild sounds like a vintage baddie, I wish Barbie and bild could coexists. I would love to read that comic .
her name is lili not bild 😭
@@slayeulgi Ikr? Like, put some respect on her name😭
@@angah82 it's obviously just a honest mistake dude...
@@angah82 cry
@@ChristianChim Cope
The amount of misinformation spread around Bild Lilli and that many folks have taken them as fact is really frustrating.
I know right!? She doesn't even look like a sex doll. All she have was adult comics that weren't even that too sexual to begin with as some porno, and then some millennial parents think they have the right assumption to say "Oh, she's a street prostitute as seen in this comic that *BARELY* shows any of her sexual intentions! And let's assume that Lili is a sex doll even though she's literally a *small* figurine made to please children since that's what a fashion doll is-" just shut the fvck up! My God.
The fact that those folks only did that just to make barbie look bad just made them look like they want attention thanks to those articles that they've created is just very annoying, especially for lilli.
The girl was a damn detective in her own movie, and yet they still think she's made for sex & pleasures, as if she was the only product of her time.
I can't even at this point-
Headcanon: bild lilli children go to USA, AND KEN then meets BARBIE
I had no idea that her legacy was so sad even as a german. I never knew about her up until recently. It's sad how much we forgot about her. And also, the fact that a big company like Mattel could just steal someone's character and leave them with no chance of defending themselves just shows how copyright never favors the small and poor artists. It is incredibly sad really.
as someone who speaks german fluently, i thought i’d translate some things i saw in the vid that where not translated:)
9:46 it says that the people in her office should be glad that she’s still in the office on time, even tho there is a traditional holiday going on, where most people dress up in costumes.
9:57 she makes a joke about being late to work.
10:03 she (probably, not rly sure about the context on this one) makes fun of her colleague by saying “if you get payed how much you are actually worth, how tf do you survive?
10:14 her saying her bf will buy her this fur coat for christmas, he just doesn’t know about it yet.
so honestly, she’s an icon.
She sounds very self confident and sassy. The kind of woman who would slap a man for sexually harassing her rather than tremble and cry and then lawsuit. Really, a better role model than Barbie for young ladies.
hahahaha thank you for the translation!
@@SewingBoxDesigns YESSSSS!!!!!
@@SewingBoxDesignsI'm so glad watching Barbie reviews about finding out about her. 💜
I don't care about the gold digging, but I do like Lilli a little more than Barbie. She is NOT a pushover.
It's so sad that Lilli has ended up with this misappropriated legacy but I'm glad you did her justice.
Omg I've actually had this conversation before. Someone I used to be friends with in middle school had a baby about 10ish years ago and suddenly morphed into one of those Facebook moms, you know the ones, and kept sharing outrage bait articles about the origins of barbie. I finally got sick of seeing them and basically said "how tf is lilli a sex doll, she's like 10 inches tall and made of hard plastic". She didn't like me challenging her 😂
Genuinely tho like it makes no sense, do people not know what a sex doll is? 💀
@@KingOfGaymes I love the mental image of yami yugi debating what exactly defines what a sex doll is.
I'd think if Bild Lilli dolls were supposed to be strictly sexual there'd be one molded to look like the pannel where she only has a tiny towel covering the front of her torso with a removable towel accessory. I've seen Betty Boop merch saucier than Lilli dolls
It's so weird that Lilli is so often called a "sex doll" when there's a huge market for pinup style figurines right here in the modern day. That seems like the obvious comparison to me. Fans of different comics and cartoons and such will happily buy small plastic representations of their favorite cute fictional girls, but give her swappable outfits and suddenly that's weird, I guess.
she's like a mix between a fashion doll and a bishoujo figure. it's really neat
I feel so sad for the german creator, getting your work stolen and then it get called a "sex doll" or "doll for men" is awful
its a doll for gay men, haha. she's camp, its great. but yeah, its gross how mattel hasnt addressed this glaring stain on barbies backstory. just pay the artist or his estate and move on with proper credit given. we can easily look this info up. it makes mattel look bad unfortunately.
@@NIGHTGUYRYAN I doubt they’d acknowledge it, especially if the Lilli creator is no longer around
@@KingOfGaymes unfortunately, i agree
she absolutely served cvunt but labeling her a ‘doll for gay men’ is still perpetuating the stereotype that all gay men are effeminate and like stereotypically ‘feminine’ things, and you’re still connecting the doll to sexuality in a way
not it imo
My favorite part of many of your videos is when you point out how RIDICULOUS people become when writing about dolls. Always makes me giggle…
Tbh Bild Lilli reminds me of waifu figures. Rolf Hausser's description of her and the fact that a lot of the art you showed is basically just cartoon pinups make her feel like a proto anime waifu lol
how dare u (lmao)
She was basically a german equivalent of betty boop
There is an artist by the name of julian kalinowski. He makes Bild Lilli reproduction dolls called Lilli Lanka . He also do repros of Barbie and other vintage dolls. He does amazing work.
love his black lilli dolls!!
I have wanted one of his dolls for years, they’re so gorgeous! His stylised dolls are amazing.
OMG, Thank goodness you made this video! I've been having arguments of Barbie's origin, and the nature of the "Bild Lilli" Comics for monthes with a close friend of mine who refrenced the often ostentatious headlines of the articles of Lilli. As someone who can understand German, i fail to see the risqué nature of Lilli who was more of a independent, attractive woman who had boyfriends, lived alone and had jobs. yeah, a lot of the humor was based of double entendre and word play, and she was far from the wholesome Barbie we have today, but she's barely a sexual figure when you consider that actual contents of the comics, which where more based of her revolving series of careers, her difficulties in finding a long-term partner, and how she was sexualized by onlookers, while doing something as mundane as walking down the street or going out for a swim.
This doll was made as a fun collectable for people who were "in the know", like pop vinyl figure, not as a sex object. I think the story in magazines (I know a bit of german) is okay and dosen't shame females in any way - it was even progressive from my perspective.
Lilli reminds me of a Hungarian comic strip character called Jucika. They had somewhat similar personalities with the main difference in their comics being that Jucika's were 3 panels long and usually had no dialog.
i was thinking the same thing
imagine what fashion dolls would look like now if it had been Jucika instead of Lilli??
oh my god it finally pays off to be on dolltwt. i witnessed the conception of this video in real time
This is an obscure fact that I'm guessing most of you don't know, but several years before both Barbie and Bild hit the market, there was a short lived line of fashion dolls produced in Argentina, that very much set the basis for those two.
These dolls were a part of the "Chicas Divito" line, inspired by the pinup illustrations from argentinian comic artist Divito. His female characters were a huge success at the time, because of their voluptuous, exaggerated features, very much in tune with what Jessica Rabbit would eventually become in the future.
Because of how popular his pinup girls were, a line of fashion dolls targetted towards the male audience were released, based on his designs. They were available as blonde and brunette, and had bathing suits. There is only one image available of the blonde version of the doll, in black and white.
So, there was a "sexy" blonde doll in South America already making noise, long before Bild and Barbie met the audience. And I only found about it just recently! .
No red heads? 😳
@@SewingBoxDesigns Argentina's population is mostly italian and spanish descent. Not a lot of red-heads here, so the dolls represented the local demographic, kind of.
Divito did draw lots of diverse pin-ups however. He would regularly draw red-heads and black women too. But the doll line only reflected the most common kind of women of the country, I guess.
I'm from Argentina too and I've never heard from them!
@@mwa9896 Es que no quedaron copias disponibles, y casi no hay fotos promocionales. En internet al menos encontré una sola imagen, y no de la muñeca en si, si no más bien de una publicidad en un diario, con una foto de la muñeca en blanco y negro.
Eran muy Jessica Rabbit, voluptuosas y exageradas en las proporciones.
Do you know where to find that image of the doll? I can’t find it anywhere.
I'm German and before discovering Darling Dollz, I didn‘t even know of Lilli and her history. I mean I'm not part of the doll community and that might be why, but I promise most people my age (born around the 90s) won‘t have a clue either and would be REALLY surprised to hear that a small German toy company inspired the famous Barbie. All of her history and the bad reputation she gets make me really sad… and it’s a bit infuriating too… so thank you for defending Lilli on Twitter. Fun fact, the Bild paper is - at least today in modern times - known for being pretty bad Yellow Press that uses dumb, shocking or/and distasteful headlines to gain attention and similar shenanigans. So when I first heard THEY published the Lilli comics I was pretty worried, but more than anything, they look really charming. They have a cute and witty tone and overall are… just really harmless. I‘m baffled why she and her doll would get international treatment like that. (interestingly though, those headlines shown by Darling Dollz in the video are EXACTLY the kind of news you would expect the Bild to publish! Maybe Karma just comes around… But Lilli and her creator definitely deserved so much better…) Thank you for the video.
bild lillis history is sadder than i thought... i feel so bad for rolf hausser, i can't imagine the burden of the guilt and regret he carries
Personaly as a german I do remember going thrue old stuff from my mother and even grand mithers toys and finding some of the Lilli caricatures!
She was hilarious and most definetly child friendly!!!
I have to addmitt (ofc bc that wasn't my time and when I still played with dolls new ones were out!) But I personaly always cared for her original story and the commics. Didn't even knew about the whole toy company drama and obvi as a child didn't care.
I have to addmit that I would be happy if Mattel atleast gives some homage or credit to the original comics! Like idk barby talking about her grandma and its prettymuch a tie to the old storys.
the lili comic reminds me a lot of jucika!! this really is a bit of a sad story, the lili doll is very cute and she deserves a lot more credit
Thank you so much for this video! As someone who speaks German, I always have to roll my eyes when I see people parroting that stupid misconception about Lilli's occupation. Now I finally have the right material to show if someone still keeps insisting that my sweet Mädel is an escort! Vielen Dank ❤
it seems like the real dark truth was the integrity of ruth handler. its just another example of how life isnt fair . you can have a billion dollar idea and someone can steal that and reap the rewards . facsinating. great video.
As a comics/dolls cross over fan, I'm really glad in recent years people have brought the facts about Lili and her history to light. She's a very interesting character and deserves more recognition
the comics are beautifully drawn
Yeah, I want a Lili Doll
because I haven’t seen anyone else translate the shown comic strips:
9:51 “you should rather give me a word of recognition, because I’m on time even though it’s carnival” (also, why she’s dressed like that)
9:58 “what, only 10 past 8? I haven’t come this early too late”
10:05 “your boss pays you by your word? Well, can you live by that-?”
11:58 “I myself would rather wait a little bit with eating - because I gathered the mushrooms myself”
12:03 “the best birthday present to you would be a kiss? Dang/sad - now I already bought you a necktie!”
(I can’t read the one with four panels at once, sorry)
20:47 “wasn’t it awful to be a bachelor - in smoky pubs and cold beer as a drink?”
Also, the Bild “newspaper” is at least nowadays very famous for being an awful newspaper. They always print headlines that aren’t quite true, have bad journalism and used to print naked women as a selling point
amazing video thank you so much. I always had an impression Ruth Handler walked by some messy or eclectic storefront and the Build Lilli was laying there, a one-off knickknack sleazy sex toy diamond in the rough waiting to be reimagined... and I am one of the people who needed to be called out for repeating this! So thrilled to learn she was actually a charismatic and glam cartoon... love your videos
shes so much cuter than barbie tbh. barbie had poodle bangs and her first mold was kinda busted in the face. eventually ruth was able finesse an acceptable copy, but bild lilli is beautifully designed and painted in both doll and comic form.
@@NIGHTGUYRYAN ya I kind of like the lips and the painted shoes. Also she had lots of nice clothes!!!
As a German, your pronunciation is quite good!
If I had to nitpick, I would say that the way you pronounced Zeitung well, but the stress is on the first syllable. ZEI-tung, not Zeit-TUNG.
But that's nitpicking because you asked people to correct you.
You're doing great and I enjoyed the video!
9:45 is basically "You should thank me that I'm punctual even though it's carnival.", explaining her revealing outfit.
10:03 is my favourite, her asking the man "Your boss pays you by your worth? Can you even live off that (salary)?"
This was really fascinating! Poor Lilli but honestly the socio/econimic/political history and influence of dolls always is fascinating and feels weird. "They're just toys" Okay, yes. But also, that effects a LOT. It's really interesting.
Now we can truly give credit for the first fashion doll and her creator! Darling, please please make a vid similar to this talking about history of Licca Chan!
there is a licca chan episode! i cant remember which one, but i think i learned about her from this channel
I am so glad that you are pushing back on the idea of Lili being a "call girl", etc. This is a drum I've been banging for years and it's likely you came across my work on this topic when researching your video. It is an absolute disservice to society at large to continue to parrot Bild's opinions on women. It's shocking to see people who claim to appreciate plastic women (Barbie) be so disrespectful of the real women Bild insult on the daily.
Even though Lilli and the first gen Barbie have striking similarities, Lilli looks a bit more “chic”. I think it’s her thinly high-arched eyebrows, more narrow side-gaze, and tighter ponytail. I can see her being the more mature, in her 20’s “Barbie”, since Barbie herself is supposed to be a teenager. Barbie is apple pie; Lilli is rich cheesecake.
So what you're telling me is that Lilli was Madonna's character in the Material Girl music video (when she's getting jewels off all the guys on the stairs)
Would love a deep dive on strawberry shortcake dolls! A history video on all the doll eras would be awesome! :)
Somebody else has probably already translated these, but... anyways...
9:48 „You should really appreciate that I’m still on time even though it’s Fasching!“ (meaning, instead of criticizing her outfit he should be happy that she’s there even though everybody else is out there on the street celebrating in costumes)
10:05 „Your boss pays you for what you’re worth? And that’s enough money for your living?“
10:16 „My boyfriend is going to gift this fur coat to me on Christmas, he just doesn’t know it yet.“
Bild Lilli is an icon.
I’m at 15 minutes in. So Lilli is just German Marilyn Monroe but as a cartoon and fashion doll?
Thank you for sharing the truth. I've known this for awhile and it always frustrated me that people believed the lie Ruth and Mattel gave to the public. Bild lilli deserves credit for giving us the beginning of a true fashion doll. 💕
I think Bild Lilli should be classified as 50's Waifu, not a s3x doll.
same. i hate how the life of the Bild Lilli creator was ruined. I still love Barbie. I do hate greed.
Lilli and Barbie are queens
Because of your channel, I have become quite passionate in wanting to set the record straight about Lilli and how she's the origin of Barbie. So watching this video was such a treat! I will absolutely be sending it to friends who enjoy hearing about my love of fashion dolls.
Lili was more of a gold digger than a call girl. The doll would be more like official merchandise for fans of the comic character than a “sex toy”. The character of Bild Lilli was exclusively found in the newspaper she first appeared in, and so she would have been thought of as a mascot for the newspaper. The doll would probably have been used to promote the newspaper since she came with a little replica of the newspaper.
Bild Lilli’s comic strip series was only written and drawn for one tabloid newspaper in Germany, so her legal copyright was probably exclusive to that particular German newspaper, unlike the comic strip intellectual properties that appear in American newspapers which are owned by corporate syndicates who sell the strips to multiple newspapers. If her comic strip was owned by a bigger and stronger corporate syndicate or a comic book company like DC Comics who would sell to multiple newspapers, she probably would have had more success in fighting off Mattel’s intellectual property theft. That’s probably just how corporate business and intellectual property worked back then.
Global copyright laws were either too weak in the 1950s/1960s or Hauser just didn’t pick the right kind of legal fight against Mattel by going after the leg joint patent when he should have defended the comic strip character’s intellectual property. The Bild Zeitung newspaper and the original creator of the comic character should have also joined in the legal battle to defend the intellectual property of Bild Lilli.
This deep dive into Bild Lilli was really fascinating. Thank you. I knew about Bild Lilli, but not very much other than she was a German novelty doll based on a comic strip.
It’s strange how people demonize and shame someone and or something who is Sex positive!
Lili needs a reboot! I’d kill to see whoever owns the rights do a adults collectors addition of Lili! 💚
It’s because she’s a woman most likely
Technically, that would be Mattel.
i think it’s less demonizing sex positivity and more a backlash against the oversexualization of women in western culture. i feel that’s an important subject, especially when it comes to toys for young girls.
@@vila777_Agreed.
@@vila777_ on that subject, yes! But also on that note! J.I-Joe is next! His toxic masculinity and unrealistic body is clearly unhealthy for the minds of children.
I wasn’t making a joke btw, I’m dead serious! 😂👏🏻 when it comes to toys for kids I love how Mattel has shaped its new form to fit everyone. But Lillie was intended for an adult audience and think Mattles “Adult collectors addition” should honor its roots and do a reboot of Lillie for its adult audience! 👍🏻
Lilli and her creator really got done so dirty :(
Love the movie poster tbh it says a lot about what she was really supposed to be. it says roughly "Millions to get to know, millions to love, millions of experiences" (my german might be a little rusty sadly)
Bild Lilly the ICON 🤩
This is my first time hearing what happened to Lilli's creators; thats so incredibly sad and undeserved
Been thinking about it and I think that in the ideal world people’s takeaway from Lili should have been „the original fashion doll that inspired Barbie was aimed at adult men, so it shouldn’t be considered weird or unmanly for boys to want to play with dolls”. But instead we got the „sex doll” misconception, because of course.
She served CVUNTY and I can't deny it 😒
I do wish had a bottle of the smell of the Strawberry Shortcake vhs tapes
Feels like Mattel made up the paper doll part. And even if they didn’t, it’s not really relevant as it’s obvious Barbie is Lilli. Insane to know the fashion doll industry has been f’d up all along
McCalls was the one that had paper dolls and wasn’t the only one. They made a little girl doll that was fashionable before Barbie named Betsey McCalls.
Lilli is indeed an icon. Although I feel for her creator, I don’t think Lilli would have lasted as long as Barbie has, or become as popular.
oh please, barbie is riding on stolen valor. bild lilli is the true unsung fashion doll, barbie is an ever devolving corporate knock off with zero soul.
I feel like Netflix should take that Barbie episode down there's a lot of wrong information there. Also thanks for making this video because I didn't know much about Bild Lilli
Fantastic video. Anyone that takes the time to actually look up some Bild Lilli comics would see how light hearted it was! Even the wholesome Jucika could get spicier than that. Lilli actually reminds me more of a Mae West character, maybe crossed with Playboy's Femlin. Keep up the great videos 🩷🩷🩷🩷
We Stan a petty queen 😂 i love the documentary “I, doll” that talks about this
I think you forgot one funny information in the begining of the Lilli's story.
After the idea of a Baby was rejected, the cartonist decided to kept the baby head but draw her a grown woman body. What result with Lilli a grown woman with the really round and delicate face of a baby.
And the barbie doll obviously still had this baby head on the first years.
Lili is kind of an icon, ngl
absolutely transfixed by violet's forehead shining like the sun back there
It is interesting to see who LIlli really was, and as to theft of the doll, well I can't help put wonder about many dolls today which are very similar to each other but are from different brands. I don't think Ruth was intentionally thinking of destroying this man's career. She was just using Lilli as inspiration. It is sad that he wasn't able to make a new path for himself when all of this happened or think of another inspiring doll though. Anyhooo, I enjoyed learning more about LIlli and I hope this video helps clear her name :)(
Such a freaking cute idea for the outfits 😭 if my Tia panchi heard of this doll Ik she would’ve gone all out like she did with Barbie
I had heard about the origins of Barbie's "inspiration" before, but it was only recently that I saw a video from a doll show of a Bild Lilli. I had to look twice to see it wasn't an original-style Barbie. Ruth Handler and Mattel did Lilli and her creator dirty! Hopefully things would be different today.
Imagine starting twitter beef and getting dragged this hard in response.
this is so well researched and brings to light a topic that I hadn’t ever heard about besides those gossip web articles you pointed out, and this is incredibly put together. the amount of time and research and digging this must’ve taken I can only imagine, and btw your German pronunciation is not bad!! it’s a difficult language and you did good!! I love this video, it’s super interesting!
As a german person, that makes me sad. On the other hand, thank you very much for this video. I did not know about it
Thank you for giving lili her due. She deserves to be remembered for what she was, not what folks want to say she was.
The whole thing sends me like working girl in translation meant she has a job not a s@x worker 😭
Once again... The most interesting doll subject matter on social media delivered masterfully. You have such a gift. 💗💗💗
Quote from German VViki:
"In the first year of sales (1955), the large dolls cost around DM 12.00 and the small ones around DM 7.50. At that time, office workers earned an average of 200 to 300 DM per month; this shows that the doll was by no means a cheap toy. Advertisements promoted it as an original gift for adults. In an advertisement from the 1960s, young men were suggested to give their girlfriend a BILD Lilli instead of flowers (Lilli commented on this to her boyfriend in a comic strip: "I thought it made so much sense that you gave me a Lilli doll the other day, now I have a suitable present for you too!" - with this she handed him a jumping jack)."
This was pretty fascinating to watch and learn the history about Barbie and where she was originally from. I heard her design was the Lily doll, but nothing more than that, and it’s honestly heartbreaking to hear. She was basically just stolen from a total different artist in Germany and he couldn’t do anything about it.
Omg its her.. the Material Girl (material is plastic)
A similar story happened for American Girl doll's pleasant Rowland has an idea for a line of doll's after visit Williamsburg. She went to a store and saw the gotz doll's and went to Germany and asked and bought the doll's and got the okay to make the American Girl dolls in 1986 the 1st 3 dolls.were released then pleasant went to Germany and bought the addy facemold and bitty baby doll.facemolds I'm the 1990s. So for a long time, American Girl dolls were made in West Germany from the start of the company to then around the mid 90s. I don't know when doll's and iteams were made in China and Mattel bought American Girl in 1998 I believe.
Superbly told history of Lilli to whom we owe much respect, without her there would never have been Barbie. An original Lilli is worth a fortune today and it is so sad that her originator was never compensated by Mattel for stealing her likeness.
WOW justice for Lilli! I knew parts of the story, but this is just so sad.
Lilli was published in a Finnish magazine in 60s. Yeah, she liked gifts and rich men, but nobody thought she was a prostitute.
I doubt I saw Lilli doll once in the window of tobacco shop (another name for porno shop that time, even little children knew it). My mother wanted to go fast away that window - "it´s not a toy shop"
She was a gold digger. Two different things.
Wow I love your pettiness!! my jaw dropped when you said "this is for that one twitter user" it was a killer move! you are the best and I mean it
The text in the picture where she gets a jacket by a man says: "my boyfriend will buy this pelt for me. He just doesn't know it yet."
what a fun video to start my day! 'barbie's sexy grandma' is #elderlyselfgoals 😆👵👠💖
Lilli sounds more like a pretty modern woman 😂. Mattel ripped off Lilli’s creator! Typical of large companies. Same problem remains today.
Depends on the woman
I was familiar with Lilli and Miss Seventeen. Ironically, back in the 60's I thought Miss Seventeen was a copy of Barbie because they looked so much alike but in reality Barbie is a clone of Miss Seventeen aka, Bild Lily. LOL I didn't learn this until I was an adult.
I found out about this years ago but after that I could only look at the Barbie founder with scorn. What gall to replicate the Lili doll 1:1 & commit what is essential intellectual property theft and then pretend it was modelled after your daughter. I wish this woman suffered repercussions for her actions but alas the world is not fair and the biggest thugs end up lining their pockets.
I've seen just about every mention of the history of Lilli but none have been this thorough
Yay!!! So excited for this. Thank you for your extremely informative and interesting videos! ❤❤❤
Fascinating and interesting video on the History of a unknown and forgotten Doll Line from Germany 🇩🇪
I’m still on the search for a bold Lilli for my collection she is definitely one of my holy grails ❤ great episode as always ❤
The married picture's text says: "Wasn't it awful, the life as a bachelor -to sit in smokey bars and drink cold beer?"
Jeez an american court ruled in favor of an american company. What a surprise. Pour Lilli never even had a fighting chance there. It's just sad, how they even tried/try to downplay it. Shady at best, something I'm too civilized to write down at worst.
I love these kinds of videos! You should do one about how the Jenny dolls were born out of Mattel’s attempt to market Barbie in Japan.
Someone already did that btw. If you interested.
It was the inflection of "fact-checking" for me. Amazing work, as always ❤
I remember doing one of my final school assignments about toys over the years, and getting really frustrated when i was researching barbie. Normally i research in English because it has a big array of sources compared to my language. But for Lilli, everything i could find was different and only shared a weird point on Lilli being "a sex doll". Germany isn't my first language but my god did i do my best to research it in german instead 😭it's crazy how even today, english sources site Lilli to be nothing but a sex doll made for men when it really wasn't. It's sad to hear that the creators of the Lilli dolls basically had an awful life thanks to Mattel casually ripping her off for Barbie. Nothing against my girl Barbie but annoying how much Mattel nowadays downplays the event
I don't see Bild Lili as a "sex doll" or a "prostitute." I see her more as the kind of characters Marilyn Monroe sometimes played (specifically Lorelei in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes) only German.