American Girl in Kansas City

Follow Your Inner Star. The saying is written on the doors as you enter the American Girl store. Plastic shiny faces stare back at you. Perfect blond curls top their perfectly shaped heads. Little tailored outfits are fit to their manufactured bodies.

Young girls accompanied by their mothers are everywhere you turn, exploring the new store that opened on Saturday Sept. 4, at Oak Park Mall in Overland Park. Located next to Barnes and Noble’s off of 95th Street, the store has been very crowded for the past week. The Overland Park location is the newest of nine stores throughout the United States. It has a mini book store, a doll hair salon, and lots of opportunities for shopping.

Senior Emily Collins has an American Girl Doll from her childhood named Kristen. Though Kristen is now a retired doll, Collins and fellow senior Shauna Kenton visited the new store with their dolls the day after its opening.

“It was weird how it’s all matured,” Collins said.

She was amazed at how many new things had come about. They had gone from simple head bands and beds to braces, headgear, and laptops.

Sophomore Gabby Magalski has also been to the new store.

“It’s crazy how much things have changed,” Magalski said, “We never had a whole kitchen set growing up.”

The store also contained clothes, and lots of them. Not only were there clothes for the dolls, but matching outfits for the doll owners as well. One could match their doll at almost every event, from beach wear, to formal wear, to even ski attire.

A whole hair salon is set up for the dolls. Six little red hair dressing chairs are lined up on the counter. Each chair has an American Girl Doll employee, trained in doll hair dressing, standing over them. Some of the dolls’ hair are pulled back into shiny ponytails with intricate braids all over their heads.

Collins and Kenton plan on going back later in the year when it’s not as busy so they can get their dolls’ hair done too. When Collins was younger she cut her doll, Kristen’s, hair.

“I thought her bangs were in her eyes and [were] uncomfortable looking, so I cut them,” Collins said.

As a result, Kristen’s bangs are now jagged and going every which way on her forehead. The hair dressers at American Girl said they could make it look new again. Collins wants to save her doll for her daughters when she grows up, and thinks fixing the hair would help preserve them.
Magalski also wants to save her doll for when she’s older and thinks it may even be worth something in the future.
“[The store] definitely brought back good memories,” Magalski said, “I would seriously go if I were anyone who owned an American Girl Doll, it’s so cute.”

Photos by Anna Marken