Doll Making - Vellore
The artisan buys the raw materials from Chennai like the fur cloth, felt cloth, eye buttons, nose button, plastic cotton fibre and other materials. Firstly the fur fabric is brought and attested with the direction of the fur flow, so that the flow of the fur is utilized in positioning the material onto the doll. Keeping in mind the fur fabric is turned upside down so that the plain side of the fabric is on the top to make the marking of the pattern for the product to be made. The markings are made with the help of black mark when it comes to light color fabric and chalk is used on dark color fabric so that the markings are visible enough to work upon. Once the patterns are created the fur portions are cut with the help of scissors. The cloth is supposed to be cut for the plain side to get accurate design pattern drawn. Once the cutting is done the fur is attested and the side edges of the fur in all the pieces of cloth is slightly pulled out so it don’t disturb the stitching process further. Sewing the doll begins and ends on the plain side of the cloth that is back of the fur texture so the stitch isn’t evident. The cut pieces are placed together according to their positions, for example the front and the backside of ear is taken together and fur sides are put inside and plain sides are outside. The stitching is made around the plain side of the cloth and the adjoining places are left open like pockets to attach to the body of the doll. Sometimes the details of the doll like inner ears are given a two dimensional effect by stitching the white felt cloth while stitching the ears itself. All the parts of the doll are stitched same way and only the head is left out at the end. Since the doll is a teddy bear, face details like cone shaped mouth is stitched with white felt cloth and nose button, eyes buttons are inserted by making a small slit cut in particular places and attached them to the doll. The head part of the doll is stitched to the body and little space is left at the behind to fill the soft plastic fibre cotton inside the doll. After filling the cotton completely the closing stitch is made very carefully in a place (space between the body and neck) were the stitch is not noticeable.
Flow Chart of Making Process:
