Elfdoll is a South Korean firm that sells resin-based ball-jointed dolls (BJD) with hyperreal features. THese “blank” dolls are popular among collectors who mod them in fantastic ways with hair, outfits, and swapped body parts. Elfdoll recently opened a showroom in Los Angeles that has become a hub of BJD hackers in Southern California. The Los Angeles Weekly’s Liz Ohanesian explores the BJD scene through some incredibly strange photos. From the LA Weekly (photos by Jackie Canchola):
“We think that we are not a doll company, we are artists,” says Elfdoll Foreign Trade Manager Yeounjoo Lim, best known to her customers and friends as Ms. Cholong…
Ms. Cholong’s job is part curator, part community organizer and part salesperson, bringing together BJD enthusiasts for events where purchasing the handmade objects is only part of the fun. At the showroom’s October 25 party, hobbyists arrived with arms filled with pieces from their own collections reconfigured to fit Halloween images of comic book heroes, steampunks, fairies, Japanese-styled Lolitas and goth boys in drag…
“Other companies, when they market the dolls, they actually create characters for them,” says Chris Holz of Melbourne, Australia, a collector who happened to arrive in Los Angeles just in time for this event. “The Elfdolls don’t have a background. They’ve got a name, but that’s tantamount to just identifying the doll. When people buy them, it’s whatever they want.”
Elfdoll: Don’t Call It A Toy Company