Anasthasia More has always known what she wanted to do. She wanted to come to NBCCD for many years and now she is finally here, studying in the 2-year Diploma in Ceramics. But she’s not here to do functional pottery. Anasthasia is here to increase her skills and knowledge for making porcelain ball jointed dolls.

With a love of dolls (and socks) Anasthasia researched and starting making her first resin doll about 5 years ago. While researching and experimenting, she posted her journey on doll forums and chat rooms. It took almost 2 years to make her first doll, and the response from those who watched her progress via the internet was incredible. Everyone wanted to buy a doll.

With a mind that’s made for business, Anasthasia reached out to a doll manufacturer in China and began the long and difficult process of learning to design for manufacturing. As a first time venture, and having to prepay for her production, Anasthasia was very scared. She had a brilliant idea of having a pre-order month and hoped to take orders for enough dolls to fill the manufacturer’s prerequisite of 50 dolls. 20 orders came and gave her the confidence to go ahead with her plan. Once she got the dolls and posted pictures, the other 30 sold out in less than one week. It was a lot of work, but these $350 dolls are definitely collector items and true labors of love. That first success inspired Anasthasia to keep going. Her next doll was a porcelain ball jointed bunny, and that provided the impetus to attend NBCCD and get help with her self research.

Fast forward to the annual Open House and Holiday Craft Sale of November, 2016 where Anasthasia debuted yet another new doll, bunny plushy, which sold out over the weekend. And, this is where the socks addiction comes in. Anasthasia has a huge wooden dollhouse that was a joint project between her and her boyfriend. But the dollhouse doesn’t house dolls; it holds many, many single socks that she can’t bear to part with. These socks are not destined for life of loneliness, but headed for reincarnation as the bodies of plushies.

Sometimes Anasthasia wakes up in the middle of the night with an urge to create and so she does. The plushy bunnies were a case in point. She’d already started making porcelain faces in her ceramics course and putting them on mugs, but of course the faces were really meant as doll faces.

Anasthasia does not make the bunny dolls nor preplan their design. She says “the dolls are lost personalities, who simply ask to be born through her”. She makes the bodies, lays out the faces and all the trimmings, but the creatures tell her how they should go together, and she never simply picks pieces and sticks them together. It’s a complete process finding the right face for each body, and finding the components (personalities) that will bring them to life. At the Holiday Craft Sale, when Anasthasia saw the first plushy bunny lying on the table to be purchased and wrapped, she started to cry and had to leave the room. In the future, each doll will have its name and an adoption card because that is how she feels about her babies.

While showing her dolls for this article, Anasthasia also laid incredible detailed fimo pendants out, that she made for her babies to wear. You can be sure, that’s going to become yet another product and new venture she will eventually head into….Accessories.

With friends and collectors in North American and Europe (and especially France), Anasthasia has fans who are eagerly awaiting her next launch. In the meantime however, Anasthasia wants to graduate, has plans for a one meter high articulated doll, and hasn’t decided whether she will go to the University of New Brunswick to complete a Bachelor of Applied Arts (BAA), a 2+2year articulation agreement between UNB and NBCCD, do a Masters, or pursue graduate studies here at NBCCD. Like many ideas percolating in her head, she’s sure the right fully formed plan will emerge when the time is right.

If you are interested in adopting a doll, you better get in line. Anasthasia already has a line up of people wanting another doll release. Visit www.anasthasiaworkshop.com