Mily and her companions, - fiancé Jacky and sister Baby - were simply constructed dolls of vinyl. Mily had a strong character face, unusually strong for a fashion doll. Her features - finely plucked eyebrows, narrow eyes and Elsa Martinelli-like lips shaped in an enigmatic smile - were hand-painted and have held up very well over time. She had rooted hair that came in an assortment of subtle colours such as ash blonde, white blonde, ice blonde, golden blonde, blue black, henna red, chocolate brown and brunette, and they all were was styled in an Alexandre de Paris-inspired series of bouffant, ponytail, beehive, Revlon flips, bouffant curls and later, Francoise Hardy-like long, straight hairdos with a little flick at the end and side-parted straight hair. She even had, like Baby her sister, those abominably ugly “couettes”. She is marked “Gégé” on her neck, under her hairline. Her sister Baby had “couettes” (small ponytails on each side of her head - yuk!) like the popular singer Sheila and Baby looked just as geeky as the singer, especially with her jumprope. The first Mily had rigid arms and legs, which were attached by thick rubber bands. Although Mily was a simply made doll - French companies of that time didn’t seem to be interested in or capable of the sophisticated and costly innovations that appeared each year on the American doll market - Mily did have a “twist ‘n’ turn” waist before Barbie did however.

The overall quality of the Mily doll although acceptable, was hardly of the exquisite nature one could find on dolls coming out of Japan. Mily’s wardrobe, however, was exciting and well-made, which is understandable considering France was (and still is) a fashion leader. The clothing all came with a label declaring them ”Gégé Haute Couture”. It was a rectangle of white satin printed in red ink. Most garments were hand-finished in some way, as the Gégé company was small and tended to have its employees doing a lot of handwork. They had a provincial way of creating and packaging their doll’s clothes and accessories. In fact, despite the sophistication of the wardrobe itself, there was something rather naive about the way Gégé presented their dolls.

The fabrics the company chose were particularly noteworthy in that they were perfectly scaled and there were so many different types. There were tweeds; real suede leather; silk, rayon; and a lot of machine laces, including Valenciennes, Chantilly, St.Gall (from Switzerland) and English eyelet, all of which came in lovely chic colours and patterns. A prime example of the quality of the Gégé fabrics could be seen in the outfit Regent Street, one of Mily’s early outfits, which was made from authentic Scottish tartan. Another costume, a superb trapeze-line coat, was done in a salt and pepper tweed - appropriately enough called Tweed: it was a direct copy of a Christian Dior coat and a miniature fashion marvel.

Another outstanding aspect of Mily’s wardrobe was the number and quality of accessories the Gégé company conjured up. They produced a series of accessories titled Colifichets de Mily. Colifichets, the chic French word for accessories, implies Mily’s refinement in choosing those extra finishing details. Amongst her colifichets, for instance, was a lingerie set consisting of a cotton baptiste brassiere and slip edged in lace and blue ribbon inserts. The décolleté had dainty blue flowers (blue suggesting modesty and coyness). 

Even Mily’s hats, inspired by haute couture, yet fresh, youthful and certainly the top of fashion chic, were well made. They came in contemporary shapes and colours, and looked like the headgear worn by models in ELLE, MARIE-CLAIRE, MODES et TRAVAUX and VOGUE. As for Jacky, he even came with Gitanes cigarettes and a bottle of whiskey, (considered a very chic and fashionable drink in the 60s - a pipe and horn-rimmed glasses, somethings Ken, by Mattel, would never in a million years have. 

It was appropriate that Mily dressed like the fashionable French models of the 1960s as she had the figure of a model. Her figure, however, was not a matter of luck. On one of the front pages of a diary, she wrote: “This morning, I’ve done my gymnastics as usual, never have I felt so supple....” Her diaries were illustrated, and this particular entry was accompanied by six different photographs in which Mily demonstrates various exercises (all in her stiletto high heels!) Even Barbie, which her gymnastic outfit called Shape-Ups of 1970, didn’t do such sophisticated, aerobic contortions, especially with completely straight legs and stilletto pumps.