A new Barbie has arrived and she looks more suited for Blade Runner than a Malibu Dreamhouse, channeling a cybernetic chic, with minimalist lines and a decidedly futuristic flair.
The pint-size humanoid has 13 points of articulation, though Mattel doesn’t say anything about actuators or payload capacity. She comes with a pet robot cat that looks like it stepped out of an anime series.
Tokyo-based fashion designer Yoon Ahn styled the Signature Barbie x Yoon Ahn Doll, which Mattel describes as a foray into the “Barbie of tomorrow.” It will be available starting Friday for $100.
The Signature Barbie x Yoon Ahn Doll channels cybernetic chic.
Mattel Creations
Ahn is co-founder and creative director of fashion brand Ambush, which is known for bold, experimental designs that blend streetwear, hip-hop and future-forward aesthetics. Ahn’s Barbie wears a sleek black and white suit with pink and molded accents, and a cyberpunk-style helmet.
The outfit takes inspiration from anime uniforms and sci-fi films, the designer told Vogue, and from Japanese contemporary artist Mariko Mori, whose work often explores technological innovation.
The U.S. designer calls her Barbie a love letter to the Japan she grew up watching — “00s tech, anime, that specific brand of future we used to imagine before we actually got here.” Barbie was integral to her childhood — “my first outlet to roleplay,” she said in a statement posted to Instagram. If Ahn herself were a Barbie, she said, she’d look just like the doll she designed.
“She’s built from a tension I keep coming back to: what’s engineered to be perfect, next to what nature already got right without trying. Armor and hair,” Ahn said. “Circuitry and softness. A cyborg cat that’s part machine, part familiar.”
Mattel debuted Barbie in 1959 and has since then attempted to keep her contemporary by releasing versions appropriately dressed for a variety of occupations, including astrophysicist, entomologist and polar marine biologist. Now, apparently, she’s ready for the robot age. Paging Denis Villeneuve.
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