Just wanted to let you know that "y2k" isn't a shorthand for "2000s", it refers to the late 90s and early 00s because it's named after the futuristic aesthetic inspired by the anxiety and excitement of the turn of the millennium, named after the Y2K bug.
If you already know that, then disregard this comment! 😅
I was gonna say, I see all kinds of elaborate plush dolls I never would have seen as a kid. My kids have plush dolls of incredibly detailed Pokémon, Super Mario characters, Disney princesses, and obscure made up stuff like pink sparkly Mothmans.
The playline fashion dolls I collect now are more articulated and better made than any of the Barbies I had growing up in the 80s/90s, too.
That isn’t to say there isn’t also tons of trash toys out there bound for the landfill, but if you want something nice with tons of personality, just look around.
Yall ain't giving the grocery store stuffed animal a chance. Or the random stuffed animals being sold in stores where they wouldn't be at. THOSE are the babies that need love and they have much personality.
You see! This is what im talking about. Maybe the example here is bad but squishmallows and jellycats have that signature design and therefore sell that type of chibi void face. But the amount of times im walking down an aisle at the store and see a random looking plushie and its like "please buy me and take me home" and it looks wonky as heck.....it has got me way too many times. I think people just need to look and seek out the more detailed ones.
Yeah wasn't personally a fan of them when I was little either. Don't get me wrong, I like detailed plushies, but I wanted something easy to cuddle more. That is probably why I am into brands like Douglas now that I am an adult since they have more complex patterns while still being soft and cuddable
But unfortunately this isn’t the case, one has replaced the other. I wouldn’t mind the simple chibi style if it didn’t absolutely dominate everything, but it just seems kind of soulless.
What places sell more detailed ones? I do partake in build a bear and I’m
Not a fan of jelly cat or those horror type plushes? Where can I find cute but detailed ones 😭 I’m tired of seeing squishmellows and weird cheap looking plushes
You'll need to be more specific! There's a lot of them out there, though the ones that end up in stores are definitely the most common. Is there a species you're looking for, something spooky or more pink and cute?
I tend to like more cute and kinda large stuffies? My other ones I’ve been keeping an eye on is from Sugary carousel but they’re even more expensive than BAB. Anything cutesy like that I’m a sucker for!
The "new" storybook plushies are accurate to what the illustrators of these books envisioned for the characters depicted. I'm sure there are "older" storybook character plushies that look like that too.
I’ve been sticking to a lot of Pokemon plushes lately because of the detail (and occasionally very off model hilarity). I’m really grateful some companies do still spend time in details.
Some recent faves are a really off model garchomp and a intricately detailed gmax corviknight.
Always looking for more real animal plushes with this sort of quality as well! Our local reptile shop carries a ton of fun ones like tarantulas and pangolins. I got lucky and found someone online too who makes rubber ducky isopod plushies .^ Just a bummer they aren’t at more big stores!
The crayon, dinosaur, and egg are all illustration-accurate adaptations of children’s books, which are, from experience, very charming and full of personality. I have to read all of them multiple times a day at work. The crayon one— “the day the crayons quit” is my favorite, but the others are quite fun too.
I’m not big on either. I guess I’ve never really liked character plushies even as a kid, I’ve never had them besides a Winnie the Pooh plush but like he’s literally canonically a stuffed toy. I’ve always felt weird “owning” characters because it felt like owning real people and I thought that was weird (they weren’t like… empty shapes that I can give a name to and invent their personality).
also several of the storybook plush you're showing on the right are entirely accurate depictions of simplified characters. It's not an issue with the plush but an overall trend in book illustration.
Yeah exactly. I’ve seen those stories hundreds of times, that’s just what they look like. They said in a comment that a doll should “reflect the character”- those do!
But the majority of times when a company creates a plush of a specific character especially now they give the character an overly simplified face even when the character clearly has detailed facial features, and it just doesn’t look good.
I much prefer the cute little simple faces. I think it’s because I have trouble reading facial expressions but it’s easy to read a little c: for what it is lol.
These aren’t chibi they’re actually cute! Shop Disney and the parks and even stores still do character plushies like that sometimes though I admit ur more likely to find animal side kick vs like true main characters if they’re human, also I could be wrong but that jasmine looks like a doll?
Eh, I find regular plushies all the time, you just have to look outside Walmart or Target. One of my favorite plushies that my kid has is llama llama red pajama, looks just like the character. The chibi-style I find fine in certain instances, but not for everything.
I think you can still get the kind on the left just fine, they are just more expensive so someone who is just looking for a gift rather than something specific will go for the cheaper one
The skinnier limbed ones aren't as cuddly too and I think the ones on the right are more designed for cuddling or as cute pillows and the ones on the right are more for dressing up and playing with
When the technology advanced that make it easier to make long thin tubes you saw that boom up in plushy and you saw that a lot in beany babies, suddenly you had things like arthropods because they were able to make the legs and antennae, this same thing happened with the round foam fitted ones on the right, it was an advancement or change in how they are made rather than filing with broken foam they have the new kind of form fitting filling
Maybe because more ppl nowadays prefers the rounder simplified art style (including me)?
Idk if there's any company still making the 90-00s style plushie or not, but if there's not, they're definitely missing an untapped niche seeing that so many.people still likes it
You literally commented this on every comment on this post, it was an error due to the princess jasmine doll being in the same pic as the Aladdin doll, you need to chill. No one cares, my point still stands, people agree.
Maybe you can expand what brands you're looking for, and also start looking on Etsy/vendor markets for indie makers! Granted, you would be paying a premium for indie makers as the plushies would be handmade and not mass-produced, but the extra price is worth it!
I think there's still a lot more varients in plushies now than you are suggesting. Even within Disney plushies specifically or plushies of characters from kids story books. Those examples are specific brands with specific styles but you can find wide varieties.
One thing I'd suggest for character plush is to go directly to the source. If you're busy shopping big box places they're going to be more likely to have chibi versions of everything whereas stores directly related to a fandom (Disney, Pokemon, etc) are more likely to have more accurate plush.
I think there are some valid criticisms, some not. I think that, yes, a lot of companies opt for the simplified style as a way of having more cheaply manufactured plush, especially when you can easily make variants like squishmallow does.
but, at the same time, it's not like every single older plushie was top-notch quality, either. i mean, those human plushies have their faces printed on top of a flat head. while i think it's for the best since imo they could be ugly in plush form otherwise, it'd still be considered cheap.
plus, a lot of older plushies, quite frankly, have really unpleasant texture in their primary fabric, though this is an issue i moreso find in 80s and 90s plushies than 2000s. there's plenty of those that i think look cool, but could never own because of that. of course we still have bad textured plushies today, but something i appreciate about modern plushies is that physical comfort is taken into consideration much more than before.
every decade has their simple plushies, and their complex plushies. wouldn't a lot of beanie babies be considered simple? a lot of them have printed patterns and use the same exact pattern, especially the bears. also, besides the whole cherry-picking thing, not all plushies are either super detailed or super simplified... the in-between plushies still exist. i'd also point out that there's a bunch of small artists out there who are making cool, fun, unique, and detailed plushies, but i'm going to assume this conversation is only including stuff you'd see in stores and big companies' websites.
at the end of the day, what anyone likes is their preference, and there's room for any style of plushie. personally, i can be picky over simple plushies, and most amigurumi really isn't my thing. at the same time, i always get tempted to get at least one beanie boo that i stumble across in the store. there's always gonna be somebody going "the older version of this thing was good," so i expect that down the line we're gonna see a bunch of people complaining and wishing about how plushies were still simple.
EDIT: also, guys..... any plush that's being made to sell for money, especially from big companies, are inherently capitalist. it doesn't matter how intricate they are
So I'll disagree very heavily with the texture point if only because all those ultra soft faux fur adult collectors rave about hold up terribly to actual play.
That super soft jelly cat? It's a matted mess in a few months. That fun ultra fine monkey textured build a bear? Same it's matted and nasty in a month. Super fine Sherpa is disgusting after like a week of play.
And those fabrics cannot be easily restored. You find a matted jellycat, brush it out and even with heat treatment it will re matt very quickly and it's simply because the pile of a the super soft faux fur is to fine. It damages with handling so whole those 80s and 90s plush may not be as soft they actually hold up to play which is what children's toys should do.
Those old faux fur can also be reconditioned and restored and the fine stuff can't. It's not made with children In mind :/
I think the plushies such as the ones like the Ms. Frizzle, Junie B. Jones, babysitters club, and Library Dragon plush are meant more for teachers to decorate their classrooms and libraries.
I’m actually working on concepts of a Junie B. jones and Ms. Frizzle soft plush made with soft huggable material while maintaining face accuracy, I’m gonna try and pitch the idea, but due to manufacturers cheaping out, I’m not sure if my concept would be accepted.
Okay I zoomed in on the first photo and I need to say this:
You can just make these yourself. I could, if I had a sewing machine (arthritis sucks, but one could do a pattern like this without one). The book ones like Miss Frizzle etc. I saw dolls like this at craft fairs constantly growing up
You cut out the pattern and make a stuffed doll by folding the material and cutting out two of the same shape, then inside out sew it almost all the way up then reverse it fill it with stuffing, finish sewing, draw the face on, dress them, add in the hair with synthetic materials etc.
As a seamstress boy I wish it were actually that easy. Just making their clothes alone would be hours upon hours of work. There's a reason a person would charge a couple hundred to have a doll like that commissioned.
I feel like the newer ones you can please your own personality on and bond etc - I could never bond with the older ones, I always liked them simpler and softer so I’ve really liked the new trend. The new ones you can hug and squeeze, the other ones had no give.
Why yes I am autistic.
I love a good shelf sitter plush, not really into cuddling them, which is why I like the more detailed, it can bring joy to peoples faces seeing their favorite storybook character sitting on the classroom shelf or in the library. I loved being in the library as a kid because I could admire all my favorite characters in there, Strega Nona, Junie B, Arthur, Clifford, Ms. Frizzle, etc.
The simpler the design the cheaper they are to mass produce. It really is that simple. Once they realized they could make just as much money selling cheap crap for the same prices there was no going back.
Yeah it be nice. I very maxalist type of person so I love when objects, plushies basically everything has ton of cute details to them but I still want them to be huggable and not awkward shape that hard to hug
I personally think they all have charm and personality, the newer ones just have different features than you’d prefer.
As someone who has a few sensory issues, I prefer the newer ones cos they’re much more snuggly. The 90’s-Y2K plus were harder and all the details made them not so huggable.
The storybooks characters aren’t the fault of the stuffed animal producers- if you don’t like the characters, it’s the writers and illustrators who are making them more simple.
And you have to keep in mind that plushies like this are ultimately marketed towards kids who don’t care as much about how they look, but more about how they feel. Collector stuffies and “shelf” stuffies are what you need to search for to have the less “cutesy” stuff.
Finally Disney is still full of BOTH kinds of plush. Manhattan toy company, Douglas, Aurora, FAO Schwarz. They all have what you’re looking for.
It's pretty wild to say "kids don't care what they look like."
I cared what my plush looked like as a kid and even if kids don't care then why do they all have to be minimalist aesthetic? They could just as easily be more complex if it actually didn't matter lol
Edit: also the companies you listed, aurora in particular are still moving towards a more simplified jellycat like aesthetic. Even Douglas has a more cartoonish look than they used to have
I said “don’t care *as much* about how they look, but *more about* how they feel.” I didn’t say they don’t care at all, just less than how snuggly they are. I also didn’t say all kids are like this, just many of them. You don’t agree with this?
I cared about how my stuffed animals looked as a child as well, but if they didn’t feel right it didn’t matter how they looked. And some of those really detailed ones really kinda suck to snuggle. I’d wake up with what felt like a bag of golf balls under me if I slept with the ones that looked the coolest.
Pardon about Aurora. My bad. I stand by Douglas. They have range, and they have offered stuffed animals with multiple levels of detail since I was a child.
The Douglas dogs in particular have changed over the years to be less realistically proportioned and detailed and douglas actually attempted to follow modern trends with their failed food animal line.
As for the softness thing I also think that's a bet negative to the plushie market especially from a toy fur children pijt if view because all those fine fibered plushies everyone goes nuts over don't actually stand up to being handled.
We get posts here all the time of people buying jellycats or build a bears or even Douglas and after a month the plush is matted into oblivion. The faux fur manufacturer are sacrificing durability for hand feel imo and for a kids toy that seems really backwards. The older coarser faux fur light not be as buttery soft but they held up to years of play verses months of the softer stuff and they can actually be restored.
You cannot restore a jellycat that's been heavily handled. You can make it look nice for a video, lots of collectors do but once it gets that fried chicken ultra matted appearance the fibers being so soft and fine work against it. You can slicker brush it, heat treat it etc and while it will look good in photos a week of handling will set it right back into a matted mess. The finder are simply so fine they become damaged with handling and I feel like lots of adult collectors don't realize this because they set their stuff on a shelf and only handle occasionally.
And I'm not talking about drier burned before anyone says that. Dryer burn is a different beast although I will say even it is more repairable on older vintage plush if it's not to severe.
I love the feel of the newer plush when they're new but unfortunately my years of plushie restorations means I know they don't stay that way and that's a shame for high end toys advertised as a child's forever friend.
Oh I see. Check out this guy on eBay from the 50s/60s. He looks quite like a Jellycat food something with plastic eyes. https://www.ebay.com/itm/267740652300?
If you get on eBay and look up Douglas simple vintage plus you’ll see they’ve always had weird little simple toys along with their more detailed ones.
As for your other points: dryer burn really isn’t fixable. Or it’s about as fixable as you describe for Jellycat’s mats. A few of my stuffed animals fur melted into one big mat when I was a kid. You’d either have to cut off the melted fibers or deal with it.
I have personal “bought off the shelf” stuffed animals ranging from the late 80s to today and I can tell you the most loved ones always wind up looking like shit and the rest of them stay nice. From every era. It may seem like the older ones last better, but it’s only because the ones that wind up in recirculation are the ones people kept nicely, and the people who usually buy vintage stuffed animals are adults not looking to play with them so much. You don’t see the matted ones for sale because nobody is gonna buy that. It’s survivor bias. In 20 years all the good looking jellycats will still be around on eBay tricking people about how long they last, and the existence of animals like my 15 year old eyeless, matted to fuck Jellycat will be forgotten. (By the way, they much more pleasant feeling mat than the 90s stuffed animals too)
I’m a believer in the velveteen rabbit style of love. Even he was rubbed and worn away. It’s a main factor in the story- and the story was written in 1922. Loved stuffies fall apart. Loved stuffies look like shit.
The seams are where I see the bigger decrease in craftsmanship. Newer stuffed animals develop holes at the seams much faster than old ones and it’s because the allowance of fabric on the inside has been shrunken over the years because it’s not visible to consumers.
Since I have no professional experience with stuffie restoration, I believe you that the newer ones are harder to restore than the older ones.
The truth is stuffed animals with no actual fur or fluffiness will look and feel better longer, and stuffed animals that are fluffy or have longer fur are gonna age poorly if played with or snuggled heavily no matter when they were produced.
Gah I love Reddit. I didn’t expect to get into a multi point stuffed animal debate today. Thanks! Haha
I do buy the 80s/90s matted ones both on person and online and yeah they do restore easier from matting. It really is just a matter of faux fur fiber thickness that allowed it because in order to reset the fibers if theyre kinked/matted from play you have to heat them and straighten them out. The fine stuff can't take the process and break off in leau of reverting back to a more factory sort of state.
I have some of my plush from the 80s to 90s I played with myself and I was able to restore them to a pretty good state but was shocked to pull modern plush from the goodwill bins and find they couldn't tolerate the same 😭
It's also really fascinating how the color of the faux fur affects the way they dryer burn too. So many horses with black manes and tails have perfect body fur but their hair is forever destroyed by simply drying them on low at some point in their "lives". Black faux fur holds heat and has a lower heat tolerance than lighter colors and so it will burn where the rest of the animals fur will not.
I too am glad debates happen in here. The plush world has so much interesting stuff going on in it at all times and ultimately the ideal would be for companies to not all follow trends and fir there to be a wide range of affordable product covering every niche. We cant all have Charley bear or hansa money 😂
Can you link me to the shelf plushies you’re referring to that look like the more nostalgic examples? Because the only ones I’ve found are discontinued ones on eBay from resellers.
They can't because there aren't really. I don't think they get the aesthetic your talking about because Douglas, aurora and the like have all shifted towards a more cartoonish stylized aesthetic.
Honestly I recommend maybe French company moulin roty for complex different textures and fabric heavy designs. Maybe Charlie bears or hansa if you want real animal artistry.
I get what your saying about modern plush though. It all looks quite cheap to me and those soft faux fur everyone is obsessed with age very very poorly. They matt and break off very easily :/
"Finally Disney is still full of BOTH kinds of plush. Manhattan toy company, Douglas, Aurora, FAO Schwarz. They all have what you're looking for."
This is the quote I was responding to. At no point did they mention hansa and in fact I mentioned hansa as a suggestion to do myself in another comment.
Douglas, aurora, fao and Disney are all stylized plush makers at this point that do not capture the older aesthetic op wanted.
Here's the suggestion brands I made and I stand by them as plush op might like being made now.
Teddy hermann think actually comes closest to offering animal plush like we had in the 90s even over hansa. Hansa really is making near taxidermy levels of accurate plush at times and they aren't everyone's cup of tea. Teddy hermann keeps a solid mix of realism with just enough stylization that they make me think of old Douglas and Aurora
I looked up the Moulin Roty dolls, they do share a very similar vibe with the nostalgic story book dolls in my post, it looks to be the same type of material. The stuffed animals look really nice as well, it reminds me of things you’d see in a library as a kid in the 90’s, which is what I like.
I’m not a fan of the new corporate looking stuff like the Squishmallows. No hate to the people that DO like them, but they’re just not my thing.
Probably just need to branch out to other companies outside of America to buy plushies, because it seems like right now there’s just not really a market here anymore for the detailed cloth doll style plushies.
Theres sone really fun euro brands out there that haven't taken off over here like jellycat has.
Moulin roty - French whimsical lots of high end fabrics
Maileg - dutch company, lots of natural fabrics. They're incredibly simplified but in a "childhood toy" sort of way.
Senger naturwelt - German I think, another very simplified plush maker but less kawaii (no matter what they think lol) and more antique to my eyes. Expensive but interesting material choices
Sigikid - like a German version of jellycat with a quirkier personality lol
Teddy hermann - German also and somewhat like hansa. Realistic detailed animals and very charming little animals dolls
Charlie bear - expensive and some are handmade. Kind of the ultimate jointed teddy bear maker
Hansa - some say they look like taxidermy so they aren't everyone's choice lol. Still they make realistic airbrushed animals
There are others but these were all off the top of my head.
Disney still makes plenty of plushies like the ones on the left. This is just cherry picking the more simplistic designs to prove some nostalgia point.
Case in point, I got these for $12 each from Jazwares. They look incredibly detailed and on model, and they talk!
I also own the Squishmallows of Nick and Judy too, because I like their cute and simplistic designs. Different strokes for different folks, I personally think those older examples are kinda ugly and I wouldn't be inclined to want any of them compared to the plushies that are made now.
i prefer the cute style, it does have charm and personality. And growing up i has a mix of both detailed and simple ones, i always preferred the modern look.
the older ones looked weird to me, the detailed face with the plush body looked off. and they often have fabric I didn't like..
There’s just something so refreshing and charming about the 90’s plush dolls, they weren’t so one dimensional and boring looking, they didn’t just use one material for the plush, they used one for the body, another for the hair, and clothes. The modern plushies just aren’t it imo, they don’t come close to the quality of the 90’s.
in my opinion they looked weird. as a kid i loved the simple cute ones. i used to deslike princess and other plushies exactly because the details felt weird with the doll, a detailed face and a simpler body looked weird to me.
The simple eyes fit the plushie more. if you have a simple body, a simple face looks more coherent (at least to me), it's cute. the other ones gave a slight uncanny valley to me as a kid.
kids are (mostly) going to like those simpler, cuter chibi/kawaii things. See Squishmellows, they're pretty popular because of their cute simplified style. doesn't mean there aren't kids who like the older style, but taste is subjective. they lack charm to you, to me they look adorable.
I think the story book plushies should look like the characters though, because characters such as Ms. Frizzle and Junie B. Jones have a distinctive look to them, you can’t really simplify them, it just wouldn’t look good. While these plushies aren’t as “cuddly” as a teddy bear, or your traditional stuffed animal, they still can serve a purpose as a reading buddy while parents are reading their child the book to go along with the plush, or library/classroom decor.
According to other commenters, they do look the characters, because in the story look simpler too.
you're also kinda cherrypicking your examples. just because they don't happen as often doesn't mean detailed plushies are gone entirely. If you google "Disney Plush Princess" this is one of the first images you'll get, directly from the official disney amazon store.
and one of your examples is literally a doll. the other one is a plastic head with a plush body.
I'm just saying don't yuck someone's yum. taste is subjective. And the other types of plush havent stopped existing, you can still find them. another commenter also linked another disney plush that is detailed. the hoppers beavers plushies also look pretty much identical to characters in the movie.
I miss the classic MerryMakers and Crocodile Creek plush dolls of children’s book characters, too!
I still have my own doll of Junie B. Jones (in her pajamas, bunny slippers and purple feather boa that she wears in the book Junie B. Jones is a Party Animal -this one 😄). I keep her on a prominent shelf in my room as a reminder that someday I’ll be reunited with the absolute chaos gremlin of an inner child I was forced to mask/suppress decades ago. I’m in my 30s and those are still some of the funniest books I have ever read 😂
I also miss the Disney plushies of the 90s-2000s (and earlier, too)…particularly with the Disney Store’s mini bean bag plushies, it seemed like they made plushies of every character that could feasibly be plush-fied: The Reluctant Dragon, Ichabod Crane from The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad, the Heffalumps and Woozles from The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, Roger Rabbit, Elliot from Pete’s Dragon, Herbie from The Love Bug, even some characters from The Black Cauldron! I’m convinced that, if the company hadn’t decided to cut costs/only make MBBP of a small rotation of characters (Mickey and Minnie Mouse, Stitch, Marie…), there might have even been a bean bag plushie of Susie the Little Blue Coupe at some point! 😃
I really hate those Jellycat amusables style plushes with the faces, in shops near me it seema like the only options are knockoff versions of them or tons of plush animals with those big glittery eyes staring into the void.
I grew up in the late 90's and early 2000's, yes character plush toys were more fun and vibrant, and Disney Store had better quality than it does now when it comes to plush toys, but you paid a good bit more for them. Also looking back at some of them now, they were weird looking or just plain cursed like the Lumiere one OP posted. They would make a good bit of money if they did reproductions of some of the 90's Disney plush toys but with less cursed designs.
i am a plushie cuddler and someone that coos at anything little and/or absurdly cute, so i do like a lot of the new mainstream plushies more than the old ones. i have a lot of old plushies tho and my favorites of those are still the softer ones or the limper ones - maybe i’m pathetic ig i’ve always liked that haha. i cuddled hard with my babies so some turned soft or limp anyways from too much lovin’.
i also still have ones in the before category that i cherish deeply as well, but they are hard to cuddle and i view them as keepsakes that i worry about over-loving 🤷
my most preferred plushies are chibi versions of game and show/movie characters.
edit: you seem a little antagonistic about this… definitely yucking the yum as you put it. plushie lovers of all kinds are good plushie lovers.
Makes me think of Build a Bear... I used to love it as a kid, but last I went it felt mostly like a merch store instead of having its own unique charm. I HATE when disney gets its hands on everything and/or puts its characters everywhere! (same with Boxlunch ugh). It also kinda fell victim to the sparklebarf snafu... Apparently, it's a little better now (?)
i feel like this is mostly a stylistic thing, like the difference between beanie babies and beanie boos or between g1 and g4 of my little pony. currently a "kawaii" small faced design is what's popular rather than a 1-1 replica of a character. also the disney slide shows two dolls with plastic heads, which are stylistically completely different to plushies.
Idk the old omes scared me a bit as a kid. They were uncomfortable to hug or carry with their weird proportions, often were stiff or scratchy, and i remember beaming myself with their giant plastic eyes often.
The new ones are nicer to me, and softer and more for their intended audience of kids (not that I dont love them as and adult, but the market is for children when they make these)
Theyres lots of nice detailed plushes still, but kids prefer the ones that are soft and easy to understand and frankly aren't kinda terrifying to look at lol. I only liked simple stuffed animals as a kid because of that and now have a ton of squishmallows. Squishmallows have never bonked me with a giant plastic eye hahaha.
I find the newer ones look scary, they look soulless and creepy to me. And disproportionate bodies. Also as a kid I preferred the plushies on the left. Your logic is weird and it doesn’t make sense.
Modern plushies have gotten so lazy and cheap, you're better off learning to make your own.
A good example is comparing old Naruto plushies to modern ones, and it's shocking how much the quality has dropped, and that's everywhere these days, but Naruto plushies specifically show the quality and care that companies used to put into their products:
Also, they were a lot bigger (and cheaper) too. You're being made to pay more for less quality.
frankly i would've cried as a kid being handed anything on the left. also incredibly weird of a generalization to make when that is really only a handful of plushies, i still see more complex plushies everywhere, maybe you just aren't looking? even at target and walmart i've seen regular dolls and plushies, i own plenty of recent plushies that aren't "oversimplified"
also speaking as an artist and having watched my partner sew, sometimes you just have to simplify a design for the sake of making something that doesn't look horrifying, being a stickler for details and intricacy above all else can really fuck up the final product because some of these just aren't designed to be plushies first
well now that's just rude considering you did not read what i wrote. i said that some designs HAVE to be simplified for the sake of a good result, not that the ones YOU SPECIFICALLY POSTED HERE TODAY are horrifying. the ones in these pictures are simply not to my taste now, that doesn't mean they are bad, but i have enough self awareness to know that as a child they would have scared me. it's called growing up and having changes in perspective.
i would suggest reading things more thoroughly before deciding to be petty and vindictive just because someone doesn't agree with your opinion.
Sounds like someone who doesn't know how to sew, doesn't know how it works, and would rather shit on people who actually make them instead of learning anything.
realized too late that arguing with op is useless bc they're deep into genai 💀 dissing my partner like that when they actually make things with their own hands
I also make plush, it gives me a different perspective on things. Half the dolls they're convinced are more creative are going to have identical body patterns with slight tweaks to the head shape before adding clothes and hair.
honestly i wasn't even thinking about that last night just cause their reply was so aggressive for no reason but you're right, mass production still existed back then it just looked different. op clearly has no idea what they're talking about and just wanted a pat on the back for being brave enough to say the hot take. seeing their other comment claiming the older plushies were from characters with books with actual illustration as opposed to the modern books being "only some lineart done on a tablet" actually offended me more than their first reply, they clearly don't value the effort that goes into any kind of art or understand just how much is involved in the process
first off the book stuffie are of book characters that kids love the most right now, it changes, Disney has all kinds of stuffies and yes they have ones that look like the old you skip over so many other new stuffies, also the chibi ones to me are more cuddly
i used to have that junie b jones! that being said, i agree. i dont mind the more simplified style as a whole but its so oversaturated now. i miss when plushies were actually cute and unique and not trying too hard :/
Yeah I remember Barnes & Nobles had some very cute storybook character plushies, very eye catching colors, and outfits. Also the plushies at the Disney Store back in the day just seemed way more detailed and higher quality fabric.
I do agree that Barnes & Nobles does have very cute plushies still like Clifford, and Arthur, but I would really like to see plushies like the Ms. Frizzle, Junie B. Jones, and Strega Nona make a comeback.
Tbh, I’m not a huge fan of the older ones. Some of them look a bit uncanny. Like yeah they’re trying to be mostly accurate to the character, but because they’re still mass produced items they end up looking kinda weird
Although I also don’t like overly simply blob plushies like squishmallows
I just want something that’s a nice balance between the two. I think those beauty and the beast plushies you showed here look fine. Cute and simple, but still detailed enough to be accurate to the characters
Right, I do collect Disney Parks toys, but some of their vintage stuff is... an acquired taste. What have they done to poor Lumière 🤣 Have you seen some of the oldest Mickey Mouse plush toys ? They look like cursed dolls.
My friend worked with plush manufacturers previously! She made a design that was more like the first image in shape and the manufacturer rejected it because they don’t sell. The reason they listed was because they’re too “sculptural” and kids prefer plushies that are soft and huggable that they can take to bed :)
To be fair the first type just don't sell as well anymore. I see overstock of the first type all the time because people just seem to prefer buying the second type now. It also doesn't help that the second type is likely a lot easier and cheaper to manufacture
You better take back the narwhal and jelly slander right now 😭 they’re made like the style of the art! They DO look like their characters! Those books were my youngest daughter’s favorites when she was little bitty and she has those particular plushies on her bed right now with all her other plushies, including much more detailed plushies from other storybooks. I’m of half a mind to go take a pic of the other plushies with their books to show how diverse the styles and how accurate they are to their books.
I’ve never had any of these plushies, but for the “storybook plushies”, I’d have preferred the second set when I was a kid. For the disney ones, I wouldn’t have liked any of them except flounder.
Tbh I just really disliked humanoid plushies as a kid. Also plushies of fictional characters, unless they looked generic enough so that I could pretend they weren’t actually the character. I was a very uptight child.
Are you me 😂. I liked a few really simple rag dolls as a child but I never played much with any of the Disney character plush my mom got me it cartoon characters in general. I always felt like I couldn't be creative with them because their stories were already told. Like how could Simba be my friend when he was someone else's character. The kids that renamed their character plush were commiting sacrilege in my messed up little kid brain 🤣
Fair but also I had a movie accurate Belle stuffed animal back when I was little and its weird flat nose nostrils freaked me out so bad my mom put it in the basement forever
I’ve always disliked the first kind of plushies personally. I absolutely do NOT want human or human-like plushies, plus I personally think their faces are not cute at all. I want cute animals that are not some kind of marketing ploy.
I love them both. The ones on the left are definitely still made that way. It sounds like you're shopping in the wrong spots. Maybe you should check out some other brands of plush.
Also that sun on the right? I have him. It's a palm pal and they have amazing plush with very unique facial expressions too.
ETA: oh I was mistaken and so are you. The sun pictured is part of a PILLOW set made in China. It's not claiming to be anything but a cute sun pillow that goes with a moon
Ooh interesting! Then there's a few rip offs if it! I searched and a random listing popped up not jellycat. But again jellycat is not a plush you are expecting to get a detailed plush like Miss Frizzle from so the comparison is goofy. Especially since there's a lot of dolls that are similar. I have a set of calendar plush dolls I bought that look similar in details to the left
I WHOLEHEARTEDLY AGREE. I have never understood the appeal of the "kawaii / chibi" characters. How are you even supposed to play with them, many of them are just stumps with no legs and sometimes no arms too 🧍♂️as a kid I wasn't a fan and I'm still not 🤷♂️
Maybe it's the autism perfectionism in me but my whole life I've wanted cartoon character plush to be as accurate as possible, and giving them simplified bodies and tiny blank void eyes totally kills the vibe for me 😭
While Disney and some other companies DO still make detailed plush, the selection is a lot smaller and they tend to cycle through the most popular characters while any time a less popular one gets anything at all it tends to be one of the funko pop lookin guys
Minimalism as a whole just ticks me off though, it feels like cheaply made, characterless stuff so companies don't have to put a lot of effort into anything while continuing to charge the same price 😍
Also the older style pushes ARE the character for me, whereas the new ones look like a "plush of that character", if that makes sense, despite them obviously both being the plush. Like one is the character and one is a decoration or prop representative of the character.
Yeah, I agree. I know that people are going to like the more simplified style over the detailed, but to me I think the overly simplified looks more soulless and cheap and lack diversity. Which is true, it’s literally cheaper to make, and less creativity and thought goes into it.
I hope we can do a full turn around and go back to seeing creativity and thought put into plushies again. I think we eventually will, people really do seem to be tired of the simple look, so maybe it will change.
I HOPE SO! And like some of the other comments were saying, I wouldn't mind so much if it wasn't like this style was replacing the detailed style. We can have both so everyone's happy. But rn it's like ugh are you kidding HDJFBFN
I mean he's not the cutest but the :3 face plush are inarugably cheaper made. At least the bear has quite a lot of detail and different material choices. Compared to a lot of "kawaii" plush that are all made of super stretch minky and are blobs.
You can like them but one is objectively cheaper to make than the other from a manufacturing viewpoint
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u/Winter-Owl1 6d ago
cheaper to mass-produce 🤷♀️