My sister and I were Barbie fanatics. We are 5 years apart, and it provided a common ground for us. We also had a Barbie room -- it was supposed to be a sauna but my architect dad never got around to completing that dream, so it became Barbie World. I sewed for Barbie, and my sister and I definitely kept an eye out for items whose scale enabled them to be repurposed for Barbie, such as exotic drink parasols.
We had a LOT of dolls and a LOT of accoutrements, and my daughter definitely picked up the Barbie gene.
My favorite was some weird 1970s Ken who came with a bunch of adhesive facial hair accessories -- mustaches, beards, side burns, etc. They had a peel-off back and didn't really last too long, but we thought he was cool. Talk about creepy.
Hahaha...I found him on eBay -- "Mod Hair Ken" from 1972.
