Sweden’s Famous Maker of Dolls

Meet Tilda. She stands about 7 1/2 inches tall, has long blonde braids made of wool and linen thread, and a very pretty hand-painted face with bright-blue eyes and a delicate smile.

Tilda is dressed in hand-made finery: a hand-stitched hat, skirt, shirt and hand-woven apron, a brocade vest with embroidered bib and wooden shoes.

She is often seen with Mats. He, too, is clothed in hand-made shirt, vest, trousers and wooden shoes. Their garb is typical of regional folk costumes in southern Sweden.

Tilda and Mats are the Romeo and Juliet of Swedish dolls, and can be found at a workshop at Mollegarden 4 in Akarp, a suburb of Malmo. There, too, may be found Charlotte Weibull, Sweden’s master doll maker.

Weibull, who frequently wears traditional costumes similar to those seen on her creations, has been fashioning dolls for almost 50 years. She began in 1942 when she inherited a clothing shop from her aunt, who specialized in Swedish national costumes.

Weibull greets guests warmly in the sweet-scented herb garden outside her workshop.

“When I took that shop over, a lot of the young girls whose parents brought them in to be fitted for traditional costumes asked if identical costumes couldn’t be made for their dolls,” said Weibull.

“I thought it was a lovely idea, and used scraps of the hand-woven fabrics to make the tiny costumes. Gradually, making costumes for dolls became an important part of my business, and then I began to make the dolls to be costumed, as well.”

Eventually, Weibull’s doll-making became her main concern, although traditional costumes and accessories may still be ordered at her shop and she remains an authority on Swedish folk costumes.

Tilda and Mats (who cost about $37 apiece) are the most popular models in Weibull’s collection of about 2,000 hand-made dolls dressed in about 200 different types of traditional attire representing Sweden’s 25 counties.

The costumes range from Sweden’s national folk costume--a royal blue skirt and golden apron with marguerite flowers embroidered on the bodice and apron--to the bright blue woolens with colorful braid trim worn for centuries by the Sami people of Lapland in the north. There are dozens of variations that identify basic regional costumes with particular towns.

Other Weibull dolls are outfitted in costumes worn by people from various walks of life--bakers, butchers, tinkers, tailors, policemen and priests, as well as flight attendants and soccer players. There is even a model monk, dressed in a woolen tunic and leather sandals.

Still other dolls wear costumes associated with special occasions and Swedish celebrations. There are brides and grooms, Christmas gnomes called Tomten that wear gray suits and long, red-pointed stocking caps, Lucia Day damsels in white gowns and crowns of mock candles in their hair, and Midsummer Eve celebrants dancing around a miniature Maypole. Some of the dolls represent popular Swedish folk tales.

Tilda, Mats and their hundreds of companions are designed and put together at the Weibull workshop, where each doll is worked on by about 10 doll makers.

Approximately 100 seamstresses are employed to sew the various costumes, and to dress and accessorize the dolls. Hundreds more weavers and artisans throughout Sweden contribute a constant supply of hand-woven fabrics and handcrafted shoes, hats, miniature books, Maypoles, knitting needles, rolling pins, fiddles, pulpits, wheelbarrows, scythes, walking sticks, tiny pieces of jewelry and other items used to accessorize the dolls.

Even with so many people working on the dolls, Weibull can barely keep up with the demand for her creations. The dolls are famous worldwide, and Weibull is a popular speaker on the subject of doll making.

The dolls have been exhibited in the United States and other countries. Models in costumes from all of the Swedish provinces are displayed at the Erlander Home Museum (Museum of Immigrants) in Rockford, Ill.

Guided tours of Weibull’s workshop are free on Thursdays between noon and 4 p.m., or by special appointment (with a charge of $3.50 per person) on other days except Sunday. To arrange a visit, write to Charlotte Weibull, Box 43, S-23202, Akarp, Sweden. Allow as much lead time as possible, but at least a week.

Visitors can watch doll-making demonstrations and view Weibull’s doll museum, which houses a treasury of contemporary and antique dolls, historical photographs and documents about doll making, vintage national costumes and weaving looms.

Weibull’s dolls are sold in a shop adjacent to the workshop. There, customers can also order Swedish regional costumes or purchase costume accessories, including beautiful hand-woven woolen scarves with richly colored floral motifs that have been shaped and pinned into the traditional Swedish headdress (from about $300).

If a trip to Akarp seems out of the way, Charlotte Weibull’s fully stocked dollshop at Lilla Torg 1 in the heart of Malmo is open Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. and on Saturday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.

Prices at the workshop and the downtown shops are the same. They range from $7 to as much as $339 for group of six costumed dolls dancing around a Maypole.

Public buses from Malmo to Akarp (about a 20-minute ride) drop passengers off almost directly in front of the Weibull workshop.

Prices quoted in this article reflect currency exchange rates at the time of writing .