Nothing embodies ‘life in plastic’ like Barbie dolls themselves. From comparatively easy beginnings, immediately’s dolls have components made of assorted plastics with various properties. This graphic seems at Barbie’s chemical make-up and the way it’s modified through the years.

Usually, discovering the actual compounds used within the manufacture of merchandise is troublesome, as corporations are likely to hold particular formulations near their chests. So, in doing the analysis for this graphic, I used to be delighted to search out that this info was not solely obtainable, however appeared within the type of a analysis paper the place scientists investigated the composition of Barbie dolls over numerous years. Their findings spotlight numerous attention-grabbing supplies modifications in response to issues or laws since Barbie dolls launched in 1959.

Barbie: A plastics development

In these early years, Barbie dolls have been made virtually solely of polyvinyl chloride (PVC), the identical plastic that PVC home windows and a few plastic drainage piping is product of. In these different functions, PVC is inflexible, however this may be adjusted when wanted – for instance, within the arms or legs of a doll – by the addition of plasticisers. Plasticisers are a bunch of assorted compounds which, when added to plastics make them softer and extra versatile.

Nonetheless, these plasticisers posed issues for the longevity of the dolls. Over time, they might migrate out of the plastic they have been blended with, resulting in discolouration and a sticky feeling to the plastic. Widespread plasticisers at the moment have been phthalates, and growing limits and regulation of those plasticisers in PVC meant Barbie’s plastics needed to diversify.

At this time’s Barbie dolls use totally different plastics of their varied components. The producers switched to utilizing low density polyethylene for the torso within the Seventies, then later to acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS), which can be the plastic that Lego bricks are product of. For the arms, the place extra flexibility is required, ethylene-vinyl acetate is now used.

PVC hasn’t fully departed from Barbie’s composition – it’s nonetheless used within the legs and heads of the dolls. Nonetheless, totally different plasticisers at the moment are used in comparison with these within the authentic dolls’ compositions, and at decrease ranges. The components the place PVC is used nonetheless require different plastics for specific properties: polypropylene for the bend-leg armatures for its sturdiness, and polyvinylidene dichloride (PVDC) for the dolls’ hair.

Barbie continues to be a plastics innovator. Some newer collectible Barbies have components product of a plastic named silkstone, which relies on the polyester plastic polyethylene terephthalate. Novel elastomers (mainly stretchy polymers) cowl the joints between Barbie’s totally different components and provides the dolls a extra life-like really feel.

Barbie’s materials future

The place subsequent for Barbie’s plastics journey? The query of sustainability is one which is more likely to set off additional modifications in composition. In 2021 Mattel launched a vary of Barbies product of recycled plastics that might have in any other case change into ocean waste.

Extra just lately, numerous media retailers have been duped by a narrative about Barbie going plastic-free by 2030, which turned out to be an elaborate hoax designed to spotlight the environmental issues plastic toys pose. Mattel produces an estimated 60 million Barbie dolls yearly utilizing plastics derived from crude oil, and every of those dolls leads to emissions of 648 grams of carbon dioxide over the course of its lifecycle. With life in plastic wanting much less incredible, maybe Barbie’s future won’t contain plastics in any respect.

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