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The New and Improved Barbie

This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at New Haven chapter.

When you first think of the name Barbie, you think of a doll with bleach blonde hair, ridiculously long legs and an unbelievable face and body. After years of criticism about Barbie’s unrealistic proportions, Mattel has finally delivered in recent years a rebranded Barbie doll into a new project called “Project Dawn.” 

After hearing of such a high demand for Mattel to create a doll that is more representative of the woman in the world, they have finally pulled through. Mattel’s “Project Dawn” is going to feature Barbie dolls with seven different skin tones, 24 different hairstyles, 22 eye colors, and four realistic body types ranging from curvy, tall, petite, and the original Barbie body.

The project of rebranding Barbie was started in 2014 and was inspired by Mattel’s huge drop in sales. In 2014, Lego passed Mattel as the biggest toy company in the world, and the Elsa doll from Disney’s Frozen started to become more popular than the world famous Barbie doll.

A Barbie doll is an iconic girls toy. Changing the design of Barbie to make the dolls look more realistic to real woman in this world  will be very beneficial for Mattel and on young girls. They are going to see a Barbie doll that looks like them, and they are going to want to play with that doll, and it can give them the opportunity to use their imagination of who they can be in the future. Making this huge change is definitely a step in the right direction in changing the public’s attitude of Barbie, and also a great way to help promote body positivity and showing diversity and different kinds of beauty among woman.

 

 

Jill Perniciaro is a Junior at the University of New Haven studying Criminal Justice. She is a Long Island gal at heart but is loving New England more and more every day. Even though her major is unrelated to writing/communications; the entertainment world of TV, movies, fashion, beauty and music is her side passion. Eating, watching movies, going to the gym, shopping, and bowling are also things she likes to do. Jill's fav animals are giraffes, monkeys, and otters. Her favorite color is purple, she loves the Weeknd with all her heart and she's most likely wearing her RayBan's cause she doesn't like to squint. She is a sister of Delta Phi Epsilon and she is hoping to pursue a career in Crime Scene Investigation. She is very happy to be a part of New Haven's HC chapter as secretary & a writer for the blog section :-) You can follow Jill on Twitter @jjillll (4 l's) and on Instagram @jillperniciaro.  HCXO
Hi! My name is Caitlin Duncan. I'm from Enfield, CT, and a senior at University of New Haven. I am the Co-Founder and Campus Correspondent for Her Campus New Haven. I am also a Founding Member of Alpha Sigma Alpha's Theta Omega chapter. In my free time, I can be found singing Taylor Swift, reading, or cuddling with my dogs, Paisley and Mandy. Feel free to contact me at caitduncan@hercampus.com! HCXO!