The Ai : Custom House Boys and Girls

Thank you for saving all those pictures! I found the original pictures of a unique Miya I bought second hand! Here's one of the pictures I took of her:

 

Thanks @kitten! What a beautiful walk down memory lane! I miss those days so much!

 

I'd forgotten all about this thread, it really is lovely to see the old CH dolls and remember all the excitement of buying them at the time (or just missing the sale - or regretting not having enough money to buy at the time, LOL)
I bought my first CH doll, a Choa, in 2004 - and somehow my home ended up with 22 CH residents who are still here and refuse to leave home

 

Speaking of the old CH dolls, last Friday I finally watched the movie "The Dollmaster", after all these years. Unfortunately it was from Youtube, and not the best picture resolution, but -- wow, all those old CH dolls in the display area of that old house! And now I'm back to wanting a St. Mina doll I've been collecting BJDs since 2005, but the closest I came to owning a CH was a Dollcatch Stella head, which I still own. Here she is from a 2009 photoshoot --

 

beamlette, I still haven't seen "The Dollmaster" !! Youtube and I just don't get on
Your Stella is lovely, a little more glamorous than Mina but she has THAT look about her! Don't mess with me, she says!!!!

 

Here's a photo of my first 3 Ai girls,

Choa from 2004, Sia and Soye from 2005
hee hee! those were the days!!!

 

@pianissimo, your trio is sooooo cute; I like how you've styled them, like regular little people What are their characters and backstories?

 

beamlette, LOL let's see if I can remember that far back! Soraya (Choa) has always been "my little girl", she was my first CH girl and she arrived in the UK all the way from Korea on a snowy December day. I took her to the window to show her the snow!
Juliet (Sia) in the middle, is her best friend from school - Juliet is very pretty and very vain! And Alicia (Soye) is Soraya's older cousin, she's the sensible one.

After these 3 arrived it was all downhill, my house was constantly being invaded by CH dolls. Doomed!

 

@pianissimo, thank you!

Your girls called for more of their CH friends to come live with you; that's how it works at my house too.

 

LOL beamlette, we had no choice in the matter!

 

I bought some new eyes for Clementine (Custom House Miya; I forgot who repainted her ><), and I can't help but fall in love with her all over again! Her eyes were never properly beveled, so please forgive the gaps. Changing her eyes has always been a nightmare because of that, but I can't be fussed to deal with it. :P I thought about adding upper eyelashes, but I'm not sure if I want to.



@pianissimo I love your girls. I wish more people would post their dolls here! So thank you for posting. I found some old CH memorabilia while cleaning like an old calendar and postcards. I also have an old CH shirt!

I was thinking of dolls that I regret not getting, and one is Shaman Varim. Siiiigh. I know @Cynthia in FlintHills has one, but I wish I had her, too!

I am going to try to keep Custom House's memory alive.

 

I am so glad everyone keeps blowing life into this thread with updates photos.
Thanks beamlette, pianissimo & honeyedbiscuit for adding photos.
CH was on its way out as I entered the hobby otherwise I suspect there would have been far more of their lovelies settled in amongst my resin. As it is, I feel very lucky to have Choa, Sia & a petite Ai to enjoy. The size of the bodies & the style of the sculpting are definitely doll qualities I love.

 

@pianissimo I love your girls. I wish more people would post their dolls here! So thank you for posting. I found some old CH memorabilia while cleaning like an old calendar and postcards. I also have an old CH shirt!
I am going to try to keep Custom House's memory alive. [/QUOTE]

She is beautiful! I think she looks lovely without, but maybe if you tried some lashes it might hide some of the beveling. I just found my Customhouse postcard collections too! I was transported back immediately to that amazing time waiting for my next Customhouse delivery!

 

I love seeing this thread come back to life! Everyone's dolls are just so gorgeous!

I'm really hoping Luts will keep releasing some of the CH sculpts. I'd love to see some of their SD-sized dolls more readily available again!

Here's a photo of my Sia, "Ruby", from last fall. She's on a Maskcat body in this image because her CH body was undergoing a cleaning/restringing at the time. The Maskcat body is a perfect fit (and color match too!) for her head!

 

I love seeing this thread come to life again too *happy sigh*

 

What a gorgeous girl Elzaim!!

 

@cthulhu thank you for posting! I was quite happy to come back to this thread and see activity in it. I'm glad you were able to snag a few dolls before CH turned into Aidolls and then kind of slowly burned to death. Your Sia is so pretty! I didn't even recognized that she was a Sia initially. I pulled a bunch of my old photos from Photobucket, and it made me miss them so, so much. I hope you and others will continue to post randomly here!

@whisperwolf Oh gosh, hi, Mollie! I feel like we catch each other every few years. TSW people seem to be scattered around; unfortunately, I forgot my Yahoo login. Thankfully, I still message Cynthia every now and then on DoA and am FB friends with Paul. I befriended @ChocoMeijin on Instagram, and she had mentioned that Neale sold his dolls awhile back. Sigh! I always wonder where some of those beautiful uniques are... Thank you for the suggestions on the beveling. I think I'll keep her as-is for now!

@Elzaim your Sia is sooo beautiful! I'm surprised to hear that the Maskcat doll matches so well with CH resin. My girls are quite yellow now, but thankfully, nothing that is banana-toned. I do wish the hands and posing were a bit better; other than that, I've always loved their girl-like bodies. I hope Luts releases some of the older sculpts, too, especially some of the more limited ones, heh heh heh!

@Jane It's always so nice to see you post!

 

I have been doing exactly the same for the past 3 weeks!
And it rekindled CH love in me too........not that is ever went away. It just took a backseat.
That PB decision has meant that I will have to rebuild my CH story website as I will not pay the extortionate amount of money they are asking for 3rd party sharing.

I took a photo of Fen (Artemis tan Choa) this evening.....I just managed to catch the last rays of the setting sun.

 

@Jane Fen is gorgeous! Thanks for taking the time to take a snap of her. I love those Custom House tans so much! I bet she was enjoying the last bits of sunshine in the garden.

 

@honeyedbiscuit You are welcome.........I am feeling distinctly nostalgic about my CH dolls at the moment. And it is lovely to see that others still feel the CH love too.
I never had a Miya so it is lovely to see your Clementine.........so many of my CH dolls had badly beveled eye sockets too btw. Positioning eyes is always a nightmare with them

 

@honeyedbiscuit I have been very happy coming back to bjd world! I hope you have been well! It had definitely been awhile, trying to grow up these real life dollies of mine! The oldest just turned 17, middle is almost 16, and the youngest is 10 now

It was Luts coming out with the CH molds that brought me back. I'm sure hoping they do some of the large size dolls soon! Right now I'm really loving my Baby Delf Gabriel, though, and the big baby size is my favorite.

Every day I miss Wolf, my Forest Jun, though. I hope Karen is doing well, I tried to reach her but failed. I think about Paul and Neale as well. I have been using my Neale MSD patterns as guides for sewing for Baby Delf. They were such good patterns!

I recently went back in to the soul within to look at pics, before the photobucket craziness, and it was such sweet memories!

 

Ooooooooooooooh, @Jane, it will take me a minute to pull my jaw up off the floor after seeing that picture of Fen!

I didn't use Photobucket (thank heavens), but I'm STILL reeling from the closure of the Dollpage -- I saved most of my pictures from there, but trying to reload everything to Flickr and then reconstruct the links in nearly thirteen years of DoA posts is a long, long process. Plus, I need to take new pictures of my beloved and still-gorgeous CH dolls, sheesh!! Nini, my Shaman Varim, is especially neglected on the photo front, even though she makes me smile every time I look at her.

Here's an old family snap (fall 2006) of the white Unique Demian I had for a while -- now, there's one I wish I hadn't sold! -- with Claudine (Limited Sia) and Flynn (Ainomori Jun 2nd). Claudine got over her Elizabeth Taylor phase of black hair and violet eyes, but it was kind of cute while it lasted.

 

@Cynthia in FlintHills Awww....thank you about Fen ((hugs))
I have to confess I felt the same when I saw Flynn again *swoon*. I am so feeling the CH love at the moment (not that it ever went away)

 

I hope it is okay to resurrect such sleepy thread but I took some new pictures of Niamh, my Hyun girl, and was reminded how much I love my Custom House beauties! She's so easy to photograph! No matter what angle I take her picture from she looks amazing!



I really hope Luts releases some of the bigger Custom House dolls because I would love to bring a third Hyun into my house at some point!

 

She is beautiful you are right. To her face this color of hair. She has a gentle make-up. Nice hairpin on her hair. And I really liked the sweater.

 

She looks so lovely in that wig, @malvinas
I second the desire to see some of the Ai brought back. Way back when I first started in this hobby I had plans to put a Choa head on a Delf girl body because that was the curviest thing around at the time, so it's funny that there's actually potential for that now.

 

@Roxsaalina thank you!

@St. James Thanks! Niamh is on the old delf girl body and it actually works really well for her! I have two girls on the custom house body (my Choa and my Ceebee) and I don't love it as much as the delf one. If I knew what to do with their bodies I'd seriously consider switching them for the delf bodies too.

 

Resurrecting this thread to post a new photo of my Hyun, Alex~ The little brat faceplanted during this photo shoot and his pinky finger broke, but fortunately it was a clean break and isn't very noticeable after being glued back on.

 

He a gorgeous guy, and thank you for posting him. I do miss seeing these guys and gals, some of the most beautiful dolls ever.

 

Alex looks so adorable in that photo,love those sparkly eyes ! You did well with that pinky join, Alex seems to be looking for it , I can't see the join and if he can't see it either it can't just be my old eyes, you must have done a good job.

I keep forgetting to post here, there are still quite a few OOAK and limiteds living with me.
Will post some photos soon

 

Alex is adorable! I love my Custom House dolls but I don't have many pictures of the large ones!

 

So nice to see this gorgeous Hyun!!

Btw, does anyone still think Luts will come out with any large Customhouse doll reissues? It all sounded so promising and exciting back then, but after re-releasing a few tinies it seems now all they do is sit on the molds they purchased...*sigh*

 

Alex is glowing from all the compliments! Thank you all That photo was pre-finger-break, but he's patched up pretty well. I got a ring light for my phone camera that's really good for highlighting those eye sparkles.

 

@solitary agent I love your boy! Hyun will always be one of my favorite sculpts from any company! So cute!


I hope no one minds me bumping this old thread to share a new picture of Rahna, my Ceebee. This girl will always be so special to me.

 

very pretty Cebee, which version was she? Lovely face-up

 

Let's keep up with the old photos and our love for the original CH dolls
This is sosuh-no, she was the first CH doll I ever saw on the CH website and fell instantly in love - but she was already sold.How I longed for her and looked longingly at her photos.
Years later she came to me on the secondary market. It was meant to be! She is treasured of course.

I wonder what happened to all the beautiful Ai Dolls that CH produced ... those were the days!

 

@pianissimo Thank you! She was just a standard Ceebee not one of the limited ones! I ordered her direct from CH right before they disappeared as a kit. Her faceup is by @elisa_maza (Angel Toast)

 

malvinas, the standard dolls were just as beautiful; my first CH doll in 2004 was a standard Choa painted by CH, she is yellowing and her face-up is fading, but she is still "my little girl" and I love her to bits!

 

For those that were waiting, looks like Luts has released their new versions of CH Hyun and Cyn. What are your opinions on the new look?

 

I'm so glad you posted -- I hardly ever look at the Luts site, so who knows when I would have noticed them?

Hmmm. They're very pretty, and also very . . . Lutsy. All soft curves, without the old-CH tendency to be pointy and oddly angular. The Hyun looks more like his old CH self than the Cyn does, to my eye, but then Hyun was sculpted in the later, softer CH style to begin with.

Anybody jumping on either of them for old time's sake?

 

I don't think they look like the old guys at all. However they are very pretty, and they do look as if they belong to Luts and not CH.

 

Hyun is still very cute but I honestly wouldn't have recognised him as the same sculpt without the name! I guess it's the different faceup style.

 

They are newly resculpted by the Luts team based on the previous CH original sculpt so they are not going to look exactly the same. Originally I thought I would be looking at the same exact sculpt (which I miss greatly)

 

I'm with you, @Izam! Cyn is one of the CH sculpts I never managed to acquire -- I was so intent on tracking down a Han and an Evan that I passed up on some good chances to snag a Cyn. I was hoping that maybe Luts would actually re-release the original CH heads, but I guess I should have known better.

 

I was probably naive to think they would just re-release the old CH molds as they were? That's what I thought when Luts said they had purchased the rights to the molds... apparently that includes the right to overhaul said molds in their own style.
Luts fans will love them, they are lovely... and I was waiting for the less cute CH heads anyway. But now I think even if they did release Jun or Gene, these wouldn't just feel customhousy anymore...

 

They also did not keep CH bodies. They are on SDF bodies. The honey delfs CH molds for Luts are also resulpted (although they look more like the originals if you compare it to Hyun and Cyn). I assume when they release more CH sculpt in the future they are all going to be resculpted since in their original notice they wrote: All of Doll of AIDOLLS will renewal with the original skill of LUTS.

PS: I have the original Cebee from CH from 2006 and her body is terrible at posing so I wonder about the new Cebee once they release her. I assume they will put her on SDF bodies and since Cebee's head was so big, they will definitely need to make a lot of changes for her sculpt.

 

Seeing that they released them finally was so exciting and sort of disappointing at the same time! I have two Hyun's already but never managed to acquire one in tan so I was excited about the idea of being able to get one from Luts someday. I also would love to own a Cyn but never had the chance. I like the Luts releases, but I also wouldn't have recognized either of them as the sculpts they claim to be if the names weren't there, and I'm very familiar with the Hyun sculpt. I stared at their picture of the blank head for awhile and even without a faceup I only sort of see it.

That said, I do really like their interpretations of the sculpts, even if I am disappointed that they aren't exactly as they used to be. I'll probably get them eventually, especially so I can add a tan Hyun 2.0 to my collection. I don't want the Senior 65 body though so I'll have to hope they add them to My Choice at some point so I can get them on one of the other bodies.

Also right there with you on the horrible bodies @Izam I hate the bodies my Choa and my Ceebee have. I actually have the newest Delf girl body (Type 5, I believe) and it reminded me of a cross between the original Delf girl body (the CP one that the Delfs like Lishe and Soony came with) and the Ai girl body. To me it is kind of a mix of the two with double joints added. Can hold a pose really well, but I don't think the poses look overly natural. I have to wonder if it was inspired by the old body with improvements added. I don't think Ceebee's head would look too out of place on it, since the body is quite similar. You can see a picture of it next to my Choa here: link

 

I never liked the 2006 resculpted CH bodies, but I will admit to being the lone weirdo who thinks the original CH bodies are lovely things despite their simple single jointing. They're well-balanced and pleasant to handle, the resin feels weighty and solid in my hands, and the ones I have sit up well and stand like rocks. That's enough to make me happy.

 

I recognize Hyun, and when I put a photo up of old Cyn next to new Cyn I can kind of see it..I do wonder why they changed him so much, there's already some luts dolls that resemble this re-sculpted version, while the old one would have added a unique look to their line up. I'm sure he would have fit in with a modern faceup.

 

I think Choa's head size is similar to Cebee so from your pictures, the proportion compared to CP bodies doesn't look too bad. Thank you for the picture! But I think maybe the neck looks a bit too thin for Cebee?

You mean the 2006 CH body is already a resculpted body for CH? I think later on they updated the bodies again.

 

2006 is when CH released resculpted versions of their original 2003 Ai boy and girl bodies, yes. That's the only resculpted body I'm aware of -- but maybe there was another version of the body quite a bit later? I really don't know about that, because by 2010 or so the company had changed out of all recognition and I wasn't following developments anymore.

Some CH dolls from 2006 (especially the first half of the year) still had the original bodies; some even mixed parts from both the original and the resculpted bodies. I have an Anniversary Boys Rock whose hands come from the resculpted body, though the rest of him is the original body. Weirdness.

 

I actually really like the boy bodies - I think they're the newer ones. I have two, one for my Hyun and one for another head. They look really natural in slouchy and sitting positions.

 

I think they did revamp the body one more time before CH disappeared? Correct me if I'm wrong.

The girls certainly cannot sit without their upper body leaning back 45 degrees because of the way the lower torso and the thighs are. It is very very annoying when I try to sit her next to other dolls and try to photograph her with them. So I usually photograph her alone standing or she's lying down with other dolls and not sitting. I don't know about the boys though do they sit better?

 

Yes, the boys don't seem to have any problem sitting up straight! Here's my IoS/CH hybrid boy.

 

Ended up playing with my Clementine (Miya) this morning and changed out her eye balls and decided to finally give her lashes. Gluing those in was a total nightmare, ugh. Not perfect but good enough - apparently my motto for life now. :P

I agree that the girl bodies don't sit or stand up that nicely. Mine has always had problems, but I love her body sculpt despite all of the problems. I liked the posing better with the new bodies, but I really dislike the bigger bust.

Her faceup feels very company default and dated. I had her repainted years ago, but I think I may send her out again especially since the quality of faceups have gone up.

 

Just sharing my St. Mina. I think she is considered an OOAK unless someone had the same idea of a suntan sad st mina. [i ordered it through the states a long time back when there were doing custom request] Hope everyone likes her.

 

She is beautiful in tan!

 

thank you.

 

She is lovely. Looks more contemplative than sad to me. ;}

Last year I had the good fortune to inherit a Sad St Mina from a dear friend.
Usually I'm not a fan of sad dolls, as I rely on my dolls to brighten my day...but in Mina's case, I've always admired her gentle calmness & I still can't believe she is here. Meenist painted her for me last fall and she is visiting with the Macchonna family, seeing if eldest daughter is a good fit for her role in my collection.