Wisdom Wednesday - Maplelea
If you have been in the AG realm of collecting for a while, I bet you have heard of Maplelea. They're also known as Canadian Girls for obvious reasons. Funny story, I actually have a couple of their catalogs. I was interested in this Canadian Girl line so I thought I'd get my hands on a catalog. I really liked it! Saila is my favorite girl, mainly because of her accessories being made by the actual people she represents. Their face molds do take a little time to learn to love in my opinion. They aren't downright ugly dolls, but after seeing American Girl faces, it's hard to see a doll with her dang mouth closed... And this will be the first time I will talk about a company that is still open! Woo-hoo! Most of this information will be collected from Maplelea's official website - www.maplelea.com
Avonlea Traiditons Inc., the company that makes the Maplelea dolls, opened in 1988 and focused mainly on Anne of the Green Gables merchandise. They became the most widely known producer of Anne of Green Gables merch. (I honestly did not know there was that big of a market for that, but I guess there's a market for anything). They made Anne of Green Gables play dolls, Anne of Green Gables porcelain dolls, Anne of Green Gables stationary, Anne of Green Gables doll furniture, Anne of Green Gables everything...
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| An Anne of Green Gables plush doll from Avonlea. You can get this one on Ebay. |
Then in 2003, there was a paradigm shift for Avonlea. They, "after a decade of research", decided to make Maplelea (most likely to compete with American Girl).
"Though it was a bit of a risk developing a line of dolls for the comparatively small Canadian market, the overwhelming support from Canadian families helped us expand our line to include 30 dolls and over 250 accessories, with new products being added all the time."
Taryn (who lives in Banff, Alberta and is an outdoorsy sort of girl who loves to hike in the Candian Rockies 2), Brianne (a girl with Ukranian heritage who lives on a farm in Manitoba and loves ballet and animals 3), Alexi (lives in a neighborhood of Toronto and loves aerobatics, and music 4), and Jenna (an athlete who lives on the Canadian coast, Nova Scotia and loves the ocean 5) were the first dolls to be released.
In 2008, Léonie (a girl from Québec who loves hockey and music 6) was introduced followed by Saila (an Inuit girl who lives in Nunavut and loves keeping her Inuit traditions, eating and camping 7) in 2011. The latest girl to be added is Charlsea (who hails from British Columbia and aspires to be an architect when she grows up, yet for now she just enjoys kayaking 8) in 2015.
Maplelea also has a line called 'Maplelea Friends' in which you can choose from 23 different dolls, kind of like American Girl's 'My American Girl/ Just Like You / Truly Me'.
Nearly everything having to do with Maplelea is made in Canada. The only major part of the doll not made in Canada was the vinyl and that gets made in China. The dolls were even sculpted by a Canadian artist.
Maplelea is a smaller line that American Girl since they have only been around for about 15 years while American Girl has been around for about 25 years. The company hopes to continue to make a new character every few years. I am excited to see new developments with this company and learn more about Canada with it!
Sources
Sources
- http://maplelea.com/our-company/
- http://maplelea.com/scrapbook/product/view/id/326
- http://maplelea.com/scrapbook/product/view/id/322
- http://maplelea.com/scrapbook/product/view/id/321
- http://maplelea.com/scrapbook/product/view/id/323
- http://maplelea.com/scrapbook/product/view/id/324
- http://maplelea.com/scrapbook/product/view/id/325
- http://maplelea.com/scrapbook/product/view/id/654
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