Life in plastic: The evolution and reinvention of Barbie

With Greta Gerwig’s movie set to hit the big screen this summer, the ageless plastic doll is having yet another moment. Suzanne Harrington looks at her latest reinvention

Barbie promises to be the film event of the summer.

From TikTok to haute couture, a Primark range for adults, swimwear modelled by Kardashians, and something called Kencore – bright, colour-blocked sleeveless men’s clothing personified by a bottle blond Ryan Gosling – 2023 looks to be shaping up as the year of Barbie. The hotly anticipated movie, out in July, is the culmination of the ageless plastic doll having yet another cultural moment. As its star Margot Robbie channels Barbie via Chanel at the Golden Globes, Mattel announced a new preschooler edition of the doll, My First Barbie, not long after the late Queen had a Barbie made in her honour, complete with silver hair and tiara. Only Madonna – six month’s Barbie’s senior and just as ageless – has had more reinventions.

Once upon a time, dolls were either scary porcelain-faced collectables or dull baby dolls aimed at small girls to condition them to the concept of future childcare. And then, on March 9, 1959, something radical happened. Barbie arrived fully formed, in a black and white striped swimsuit and cat’s eye sunglasses. Giraffe-proportioned, 35 pounds underweight for her height with Mae West bosoms and no vulva, she broke the dolly mould, and small girls squealed in delight at her impossible glamour. For the past 64 years, Barbie has been the queen of hot pink kitsch, and the scourge of feminism.