Hasta La Ideas

We’re only halfway through February and already we have seen Barbie stripped into her various Korean components and outed as having been designed by a sex-crazed swinger, yet we haven’t even arrived yet at the iconic doll’s 50th birthday in early March. But while these previous stories have been somewhat odd, here’s a more happier take, celebrating Barbie for all her plastic-y goodness. At New York’s upcoming Fashion Week (wherever it winds up), fifty big name designers will be rolling out new outfits for Mattel’s bread and butter, including Nicole Miller, Diane von Furstenberg, and Betsey Johnson, all likely fitting like a glove on the anatomically-bizarre, forever smiling, half-century-old fake lady. Here’s a bit:

Nicole Miller’s checkerboard trapeze dress and swing coat is the third outfit she has done for Barbie, filling a childhood void from a time when her French-born mother wouldn’t let her have one of the dolls.

“I always envision Barbie in that ’60s mode — I made her mid- to late-’60s mod,” said Miller. It’s a version of a dress Miller put in her very first runway show, worn by Linda Evangelista. “It was the season she was a blond. I immediately thought of that outfit.”

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