Who was Barbie modeled on?

With Greta Gerwig’s film, Barbie, drawing massive attention, here’s a look at who the original doll was based on.

Greta Gerwig’s Barbie has become one of the most highly anticipated movies of the summer.

Starring Margot Robbie, Ryan Gosling, Issa Rae, and a whole host of A-list actors, the movie sees the titular doll expelled from Barbie Land. Along with Ken, she goes on a journey of self-discovery through a very different real world.

But, who was the model for the world’s most famous doll? Here’s everything we know.

Barbie was modeled after German risqué gag gift

Ruth Handler, the co-founder of the toy company Mattel, introduced Barbie on March 9, 1959. According to Brittannica, the doll itself was modeled after “the German Bild Lilli doll, a risqué gag gift for men based upon a cartoon character featured in the West German newspaper Bild Zeitung.”

Because Barbie was semi modeled after a gold-digging sex symbol, mothers in the 1950s often criticized her for “having too much of a figure.” But, Mattel sidestepped the criticism by advertising directly to children.

This decision proved to be incredibly successful as Barbie became a household name as, for the first time ever, kids could play with a doll that looked like a woman instead of just baby doll toys.

Mattel

However, because Barbie looked so much like Bild Lilli, this resulted in Rolf Hausser, whose toy company created and sold the Lilli doll, to file two separate lawsuits against Mattel in which they claimed that Mattel was infringing on their copyright for Lili.

Hausser even went so far as to strike a licensing deal with Mattel’s rival, Louis Marx, who began using the Lilli head molds to create Miss Seventeen, a less successful Barbie competitor. But, in the end, Hausser sold the copyright and patents to Lilli to Mattel in 1964 for a small sum of money.

Nowadays, Mattel has distanced themselves from the connection with Lili as their new origin story for Barbie is that Ruth was “was inspired by watching her daughter play with paper dolls.” But, history will never forget the sex symbol that helped launch the world’s most famous doll.

Barbie drives into theaters on July 21, 2023. For more of our coverage, click here.