Hello, Sachiko!

No, not this Sachiko.  I managed to find a Hot Looks Sachi. 

Trust me, this is Sachi, not Stacey.  Sachi and Stacey look a lot alike, but there are ways to tell the two apart.  Sachi comes from the second wave and is thus pretty hard to find.  My doll doesn't have everything; she's missing most of her accessories, and she has some very minor runs in her legs...

...but the rest of her is pretty well intact.  I can probably keep those runs from worsening with a dab of tacky glue.  Anyway, I already have two Hot Looks dolls, both Chelsea, but a perusal of Chelsea's review reveals that one of my Chelsea dolls (C.C., or "Canadian Chelsea") is wearing part of Sachi's stock outfit.

C.C. has politely agreed to hand over her socks and her red bracelet to Sachi now, as she has her own bracelet (which she always had) and her own socks (which she DIDN'T always have).  The belt is also Sachi's, but I let C.C. keep that and tied a bow around Sachi's waist, one that matches her hair bow.  Since Sachi's overall look is supposed to be semi-retro, I chose polka dots.

None of it really matches, but Sachi looks a little more put together now that she's got some headgear.  Heck, no doll of mine is complete without some sort of bow; even Flaxie wears them on her ears!

Such bows are necessary with Flaxie when she wears blue jeans (like she is now), as without them there's no other way to tell that she's a girl.  Anyway, since I now have Hot Looks dolls from both the first and second waves I'm going to do a brief comparison, as there were a few minor differences.  Location was the main difference, as Sachi and her second-wave friends were only available in Canada, but there's no visual evidence of that, LOL!  Hands are the easiest way to tell Wave 1 from Wave 2; I noted in Chelsea's review that the first wave had a separate pinky finger, while the second wave had all the fingers together with only the thumb separate.  Sachi's stitching is not as neat as Chelsea's, but she does have all four fingers!

The other main way to tell is earrings.  Chelsea has disc-shaped studs that accommodate dangles with hooks, while Sachi has hemispherical studs that accommodate a post of sorts.  It's hard to tell from these pictures, but Sachi's studs are significantly bigger than Chelsea's.

The post fits into a hole in the bottom of the stud.  I don't know how well this method of attachment worked, but so few of these dolls from either wave have intact dangles that I'm willing to guess the attachment wasn't a strong one in either case.

One thing that didn't change between waves was faces.  Or they didn't change much.  Chelsea and Sachi appear to have the same mold, as do all the Hot Looks dolls.

BUT...now that I look closer there are some differences in the painting styles.  Sachi's lips appear to be fuller than Chelsea's.

I'll have to admit that I'm not a fan of Sachi's hot pink lips, but then I didn't like Chelsea's orange-tinted lips either.  Do I EVER like the lip color on a doll???  LOL, if I'm not harping about a doll's eyebrows I'm griping about lips!  Speaking of eyebrows, eyebrows are another good way to distinguish Wave 1 from Wave 2.  Sachi's eyebrows are brown and not black like her hair, but black eyebrows can be harsh, so I'll not fuss about that.  More noteworthy is the paint style; Chelsea has some individual hairs painted in, and Sachi does not.

Good way to segue into eyes.  I'll be blunt:  I like Sachi's eye paint better than Chelsea's.  Chelsea's eyes are not ugly by any means, but Sachi's eyes are sharper and have a smidge more detail.  She has a few dashes of visible eyeshadow that doesn't look like bruising (Chelsea's eyeshadow can look a little like bruising under some lights.  I also like that Sachi's eyes are brown.  Brown eyes can look lifeless on a doll, especially if the eyes are inset, but painted brown eyes are less of a gamble.

Hairstyles didn't vary a lot among the Hot Looks, but textures did.  Most of the girls had curly or straight hair, with Chelsea sporting a unique crimped style and feathered bangs.  Sachi's hair is stick-straight with a full set of very curly bangs.

I don't like the bangs on these dolls because they're next to impossible to control, but that's the fault of age, not the dolls themselves.  Very few dolls with bangs make it through the years without their bangs getting at least a little mussed.  I was able to fix Chelsea's and Sachi's bangs even though Sachi's were snarled up in her main hair, but C.C.'s bangs have proven stubborn.

Okay, it's just one segment that wants to pop up, but being OCD it still bugs me.  Likely a spritz with warm water and a night in a cotton sock will get that segment to lie down.  But overall that's it.  I've got three Hot Looks dolls now, and I may add one more (I'm quite fond of Zizi).  Owning Sachi has given me a good idea of how much (how little?) things changed between the first and second waves.  Sometimes quality diminishes as a doll line ages, but...well, for the most part Sachi is just as good as Chelsea is, and in a few ways (the eye paint and the straight hair) she's better.  The stitching on her hands is a little crude, but that's all I have to say against Sachi.  She was worth the search.  Now to find a jukebox for her to lean against; Mama is dead-set on my Hot Looks having a jukebox for some reason.  Sachi's biography does state that she wants to own a jukebox of her own, so that's not a terribly outlandish prop to have for these dolls.  Too bad Maryellen's jukebox is expensive!

Much love,

RagingMoon1987