Barbie Fashionistas Curvy, Tall, Petite

Yeah I finally got around to this one, i'm a lazy bum okay?

Well actually it was more I was after specific dolls of each body shape and didn't want to buy just any ol' one.
Also the curvy ones have proven the most impossible to get in stores.

I finally ordered the curvy I wanted, and so I finally have one of each body to review. Whoo.

Back at the start of the year Mattel had exciting news, Barbie was getting some body diversity!
Not 1, not 2, but 3 whole new bodies were released alongside her regular 99 body.
Those bodies were Tall, Petite and Curvy.

Of course the doll community were keen to see how they'd done this, how clothing options would work, how the curvy body particularly would LOOK in the wake of Lammily and her potato shaped torso (seriously, she looks like a spud with a head attached, it's not overly easy to dress a doll so shapeless because they don't squish like flesh does.)

It took me a while to get a hold of each of the ones I wanted from the lineup. And as I mentioned, curvy dolls sell out everywhere. I have only ever seen ONE (the blonde barbie one) on a shelf all year. Usually it's a few petites and a couple of generic bodied ones and maybe a tall.
So is curvy super popular? Gotta assume so, which in a way is great.
It IS a pretty hot body.
ahem.

The Fashionistas for this year are much like last year's offerings in that they're £10, they come in slim boxes and on unarticulated static bodies with a simple but cute outfit (most of the time it's a short dress)
They still have the bizarre some heeled, some flat, some semi heeled feet situation which makes sharing shoes across the line impossible but now they also have 4 body types to further complicate matters and make for even LESS mix and matching.

*headdesk*

And don't get me wrong, I love the new bodies, the idea is great, it's just kinda strange to have a doll line where there's so little compatibility of shoes and outfits when Barbie has for so long been that standard. Of course, eventually it won't be a problem anymore because enough of each shape will have been released that you'll have a nice wardrobe stockpiled, but it's gonna take a while and it's not always clear on the fashion packs or just looking at a garment without a doll in it which shape it fits.
I can see this being problematic on ebay in the future with generic "barbie" branded stuff not necessarily fitting because they were made for the chunkier body or the tall body or something.

and the shoes... damn the shoe thing is dumb. I mean I always hated Barbie's little hoof feet but why are there 3 different foot heights now? plus now with the bodies, 2  different shoe LENGTHS too?!
NIGHTMARE!
I spent like 5 minutes trying to remember who's boots were who's for two of my 2016 Fashionistas, it's not really immediately obvious looking at them.

So it's an idea that's not without flaws. Still it's not like mattel is the only company pulling this weird heel/flat thing or the different body shapes because screw compatibility. The way kids play with dolls has changed, maybe these factors just aren't important any longer? Maybe they don't want a huge wardrobe now, they'd rather have diversity? It's the price we pay I guess to have body shape diversity and such.
I still don't get the shoes though. They add nothing to my eye except adding a random extra difficulty in redressing.

These are all 4 bodies. Mostly redressed though because I like to dress my dolls up.

I think the "generic" barbie in the plaid is actually from the wave before this one but she's got a standard Barbie body so who cares? She'll be acting as our comparison dolly.
Her name is Cassandra.

The others don't have proper names. They are Red Afro, Resting Bitch Face and Ebony

I have a second Petite not pictured who's just referred to as "the paler skinned one" lol. Yes, I now have so many dolls I can't even be bothered with names. This is bad.

Anyway,

let's strip some Barbies!

I will say this, the curved hand on hip that some of these fashionistas have is a PAIN, it makes putting clothes on and taking them off SO HARD, like how is a kid supposed to do this? It's really difficult to get sleeves on and off, I can see a great deal of frustration from younger kids trying to play with these. The straight arms are way easier, prefer those.

NUDITY! EEEK

One of the things I really enjoy about the newer Fashionistas is the mix of skin tones and face sculpts. They're really using like all their face sculpts from the backcatalogue and a lot of newer ones too and it's awesome to see so much variety. Same with the skin tones, it's incredible how the same sculpt can look so different in a paler or darker plastic.
I admit a have a few favourites. I am a SUCKER for the Goddess sculpt, I freaking love that sculpt so much, and Mbili is another I just swoon for.

Resting Bitch Face (RBF as I shall call her) is the palest of my 2016 Fashionistas. I tend to find whitey white dolls a little boring when I have the option of gorgeous colours like that dark toned Petite there. I mean come ON, that is gorgeous, why would I want a pink dolly when I can have that?
It's also great for kids, because such a huge variety makes it way more likely you can find a doll that looks more like you/your kid/people in their class. How important is it that a kid see a doll that looks like them on a shelf? SUPER important. To see a darker skinned doll promoted as beautiful alongside the generic blonde tanned california girl is huge and it's great to see Mattel really pushing forward with having more variety and embracing all shades and all shapes like this.
Also delighted to see a large variety of hair textures. My other petite has really thick curls, several of the darker skinned dolls have hairstyles appropriate to their culture (like afros, there's one coming out next year with cornrows! proper tight curls and so on) This is again, really really good for body positivity and the stories you read or hear about how much it means to a kid or indeed an adult who grew up in a culture telling her "your hair is ugly, you're ugly" to see a barbie doll that looks just like you it's like "omg finally!"

Yay Mattel!

Anyway, body shapes.

Tall, generic, curvy, petite.

Tall is this willowy kinda boyish figure with a very small bust, next to no hips and legs for ever man. Whoo eee those legs.

Generic is of course your standard 1999 Barbie body shape with the C cup boobs, cinched waist and washer board tummy.

Curvy is hot. No seriously she is. She's got these great thighs that are no joke as wide each as her head is. She's got a pinched in waist that looks sexy when she's wearing clothing (sort of like if you were to wear a waist cinch or something) and a big ol' booty out the back. She has touching thighs and a paunch tummy and while obviously a bit chunky in shape, she's attractively curvy and I love it. My body shape is kinda similar (a little less rotund but still similar) and it's nice to see on a doll.
It's also the body shape I tend to find most attractive on a woman heh, I like big butts and I cannot lie?
<_<

Finally Petite who's a bit thicker in the waist than generic but has a fairly similar body shape to her, just at a smaller scale. Her torso seems more proportionate to me than generic Barbie, who's weirdly stretched out and not really very anatomically correct. (better than original barbie though yeesh)

In fact all three new bodies just feel more realistic in the way they're sculpted. They have human shaped torsos, they look like they'd have ribs inside there, and internal organs lol. They look HUMAN.

Booties!

Tall has like.. no butt. Her butt is so teeny. Poor Tall, she needs more meat on her bones but she's probably one of those people who just can't gain weight. She's all gangly and flat.

Curvy has a great butt. It sticks out a lot.

Petite has a little booty.

but.. but.. look at the sculpting on the back of these, there's like.. a spine indent and shoulder blades and stuff.  It's really subtle, but it's nice.
All the new bodies are marked 2016, while generic is marked 2013, I assume that's the curved arm and weird legs (she has odd legs, we'll get to that) rather than her torso which looks identical to the 99 bodies.

For reference, this is generic Barbie's body from the side.

Note her legs? One leg is sliiiightly bent so she's in a walking pose. It makes her a nightmare to stand up. Also means one foot is flat and the other isn't quite. Wth?

What is this all about?

Generic Barbie's body, with that ridiculous cinched in waist. I don't actually mind this body, it looks nice dressed, certainly it's immensely nicer than the original Barbie body they used all through the 80s and 90s when I was growing up. Modern barbies don't have the linebacker shoulders, the huge inflated boobies, the teeny wasp waist and weird topheavy shape.
It's a balanced body, not overly realistic but not overly horrible either I don't think. I'm not sure why this body gets so much hate from people claiming it's unhealthy, I think a lot of complainers are remembering the old barbie body and don't realise that body hasn't been used since 1999.
The shine on this makes her boobs and tummy look like something rude <_< I can't unsee it. I'm sorry.
You're welcome.

That stupid curved arm, I hate it.

Cassandra's sculpt has no official name, it's unofficially "Kassandra" apparently. Marked 2014 on the back of her head. I think she's the only doll to use this sculpt so far.
It's a cool sculpt, she's ambiguously "ethnic" without being stuck to one specific ethnic group. There's to my eye something polynesian perhaps about her? Who knows. She's beautiful and unique and I love her. Despite her stupid arm.

Tall's body is REALLY flat. Like, she's got teeny boobs and no butt. She's also got no real hips. She's a very "ruler" shaped body which is one of the most difficult body shapes to dress. But it's a body shape a lot of women have and it's great to see it represented, particularly with this current trend of "real women have curves" statements, it makes women who's natural body shape isn't curvy in the slightest feel less feminine and that's not fair.

I find it interesting they opted to give her such a straight up and down torso rather than bow to the standard conventions and just make her taller but still with the wasp waist. It makes her body shape quite unique in the lineup.

And despite her limbs being slim, they're still shapely which I like. I hated that about the taller Bratz for instance, they had this really nice torso shape and ruined it with twig shaped legs that were basically shapeless tubes. No no no. These are what arms and legs look like.

I LOVE this face, she's so sweet and innocent looking. This is the Mbili mould I think, which of course I love. She's so sweet. Also she has a bright red afro, come ON, that's awesome.

I shall refer to these feet as "semi heeled" feet. she has longer than regular barbie feet but they're in this semi tip-toe position.
Curvy has the same foot shape, interestingly.

As you can see, Tall really IS tall. I mean she's positively gigantic alongside generic barbie. She stands a good 3-4 cm taller.
At 29cm (approx) tall, Barbie is supposedly 1/6 scale. This makes Barbie about 5'7? That makes "tall" Barbie about 6'3-6'4!!
Wooooah.

She's a tall lady.

Petite incidentally using the same calculation comes in at around 5'3"

Tall DOES fit into Petite's dress, but it's sinfully short.

Other Petite's dress is kinda hot on her though...

Surprisingly she actually does fit into the generic Barbie romper. Hmm.

More Generic Barbie stuff seems to fit as well.

Another generic Barbie dress from a fashion pack. the top is stretchy and the free size makes it quite versatile.

The unknown plaid dress Cassandra wears fits like a sack on poor Tall.

The big problem I had with Tall wasn't that she couldn't fit a lot of stuff, she really can, more she just looks awful in most things. It was a challenge, as of course most Barbie stuff is designed for an hourglass body shape which simply does NOT suit a ruler or rectangle body.
She'd look great in some high waisted shorts and a crop top or something though.

I opted for trousers for mine, her default outfit was super ugly to my eye with these horrible shorts and a sort of shapeless sweater. Noooo thanks.

Next up is Curvy. She's such a chunky doll, just picking her up it's obvious how much bigger she is than a regular Barbie doll.

She has a slightly pear shaped body with the most emphasis being on her belly, butt and hips. Her legs are thick and shapely and her bust is actually very modest. She looks a bit pinup to me heh. I think she'd look amazing in 50s stylings.

Her tummy has a very slight paunch and her butt sticks out.

And her thighs touch, kinda.. mostly.

Her face sculpt I don't think has a name, I just refer to it as bitch face because she totally has a resting bitch face, it's why I wanted her. She makes me smile. It's marked 2015 on the back.

Her feet are the same as Tall's, so they can share shoes.
they are the only two out of 5 fashionistas on my desk who can share shoes.
Seriously Mattel?

She's almost twice as wide as regular Barbie, she makes generic babs look so weird and rake-like. Look at her legs! I love those legs, seriously. They make generic's legs look like easily snap-able twigs! Even her arms are thicker, it's glorious.

Curvy is the most problematic to dress because she's so much broader than any of the other dolls.
From the front Petite's dress looks okay...

But it won't do up.

Likewise Tall's shorts simply don't fit.

And while generic's romper looks okay from the front...

Her booty is just too bootilicious for it.

 Separates were a little more successful. The skirt has to sit really high to fit around her waist, and the top is tight in the sleeves but it's workable.

The purple dress works, this dress is awesome in that it fits everyone.

Stretchy cotton generic Barbie dress looks actually pretty hot. It's such a boring shape on the generic body.

Curvy makes it look GOOD.

Sparkle girls stuff is waaaaaay too short and the waist becomes an issue.

So.... all in all I didn't find anything in my huge box of clothing that looked better on her than her default dress.
Which is way too big for anyone else to wear.

Hmm.

Finally Petite!

She has a nice hourglass body shape, similar to the generic body but smaller and slightly curvier actually.

She has a bit of a sway back, making me think of Monster High heh.

She's one of the darker tones Mattel sometimes does, quite hard to photograph but oh so beautiful to look at. I wish more dolls came in this tone. It's so pretty.
I think her head sculpt is Mbili as well.
She's got awesome curls all piled up on top of her head with faint reddish pink streaks.

Petite is definitely shorter than generic Barbie, she stands around 27cm tall compared to generic's 29cm. Interestingly her arms are still a similar length, it's her torso and legs that are short.
Like curvy, Petite's legs make generic's legs look like twigs though she seems to use the same arm sculpt as generic. Her waist is a bit thicker but her hips are a similar width to generic, and her shoulders are a bit narrower.

Tall's shorts sort of swamp her. They stay up, but they're big.

The skirt of this ensemble is a bit big but workable, the top however is too big on the shoulders and falls down.

That purple dress again yes, FITS. wth?

As does the stretchy generic Barbie dress.

MC2 stuff fits pretty much perfectly.

Skipper sized/HSM stuff fits too. She's a similar height to modern Skipper in fact, just more maturely shaped.

Sparkle girls stuff can still be too short (go figure)
Tops and longer dresses will probably work though.

Neither Petite I own can share shoes. One has flat feet, the other full heel feet. Their foot size is similar if not identical to generic barbie so they can wear Barbie shoes IF they have the same shape of foot (so heeled should be able to wear most Barbie footwear)

It's so so weird having all these foot shapes. If Curvy and Tall share a foot size and Petite and Generic, and there's 3 different foot shapes (heel, semi heel, flat) that means there's 6 different shoes/feet across the range. Wth?
man that's a headache.

As for clothing, curvy proved the hardest to find clothing for. The others I managed to redress with my large supply of various clothing from different doll lines. One petite is wearing a liv dress, the other is wearing a barbie tunic dress and a pair of jeans I think are from a barbie clone.

Tall got My Scene jeans, a moxie boyz shirt (because it's long so fits her elongated torso) and a 4 ever best friends vest thing.

I didn't find anything that looked really amazing on Curvy.. yet.
poor Curvy.

She's still my favourite though.

shh don't tell the others