1991 Shani Doll
Shani is a face sculpt patented in 1990 and first introduced with the Shani character in her own doll line, The Marvelous World of Shani.
Overview[]
This face sculpt debuted alongside Asha (Face Sculpt ©1990), Nichelle (Face Sculpt ©1990), and Jamal (Face Sculpt ©1991) in the aforementioned Shani doll line. The series was discontinued after 3-4 years but the sculpts and even the body continued to see use in the Barbie line ever since. Shani's face was also used as the official face for the Asha - African American Collection doll line, a character who confusingly used the same name as Shani's friend Asha despite not being the same character. After the Asha doll line was also discontinued, Shani as a face only saw occasional use in the collector doll line throughout the 90's, while also having a brief performance as Barbie's friend Christie in the Sparkle Beach line. Outside of a one-time use as the face for Michelle Williams in the Destiny's Child Dolls line in 2005, the sculpt was retired in 2001 after being used for the AA version of Gone Platinum Barbie. The face wouldn't resurface until Carlyle Nuera used it as the AA face for 2017 Birthday Wishes Barbie in 2017, resulting in Shani being used more often as a face sculpt for AA dolls ever since.
Overall, Shani's face is the rarest out of the four sculpts introduced in the Shani line, as Asha famously got overused for AA versions of Barbie and her friends, Nichelle saw more use for collector dolls as an AA counterpart to the closed-mouth Bob Mackie (Face Sculpt ©1991) instead of Shani, and Jamal become Steven's new face throughout the 90's and was used frequently for AA versions of Ken throughout the 90's and 2000's.