American Girl

When I was four, I cut out pictures of American Dolls from the monthly catalogue and taped them on my wall. Samantha was my first (I wanted her, I told my mom, because "she looks like me!"), but I soon added Felicity and Kit to my collection. I bought and read all the books, and spent hours exploring the girl's historical backgrounds. Now, as a 21-year-old college student, I still treasure my American Girl dolls and plan on passing them onto my own daughters.

An American Girl's store opened in the Tyson's Corner mall in McLean, Va., this weekend. People arrived as early as 2:30 on Friday afternoon for the Saturday grand opening and slept overnight outside the mall, while others stood in line at 5 a.m.

If my 8-year-old self could have seen me at the store on opening day, I would have been very jealous of myself. As I wandered throughout the giant two-story store, I recalled the hours I spent pouring over my American Girls catalogue as a kid, picking out which outfits and accessories would go to the top of my Christmas list.

Unlike Barbie's focus on a perfect body, boyfriend, car, and high fashion, American Girl revels in the innocence and sweet simplicity of girlhood. It meets girls right where they're at, rather than forcing them to focus on something they are not.

Wade Opland, Vice President of American Girl's retail, has been working on opening up a store in Tyson's for the past three years. Girls today are growing up far to quickly, he said, but American Girls is trying to keep girls young. He said he loves seeing a 14 or 15-year-old girl come in and get excited about a new doll.

"American Girls celebrates girls and seeks to create girls of strong character," he said, "American Girls are wholesome. They are like the vitamins and chocolate cake."

Opland noted that Bratz dolls have no content or story, but American Girls encourage girls to read and grow closer to their families. By reading about the trials of girls living in the Great Depression or on the prairie, girls of today can learn how to manage their own troubles.

Families could stop at American Girl's bistro for lunch, dinner, or a two-foot banana split, while dolls could sit in pink chairs that hook onto the tables with their own tiny plates, cups and spoons. A party room is available for birthday celebrations. There's also a doll T-shirt-making studio and a hair salon, where girls can place their dolls in pint-size pink swivel chairs and pick a new 'do from 22 styles.

American Girls stands out from other toy companies because of its family-centered focus, Opland stated. Stores have a "date with dad" day, where fathers and daughters can have lunch together at the store, while having a list of questions to ask each other.

Entire families, moms and their daughters, extended family members, and even excited teenagers came to the opening. Celia Baula, and her daughter Christine, 11, were picking an outfit. "It's not a focus on I-have-to-be-perfect, like Barbie," she said. "American Girl accepts her for who she is."

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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