Woolie Cinnamon? Has a new variety of Woolie been spotted?  Who really designed Abby and Oscar? Was Gilbert White the mistake all us of thought he was?  These questions and more were finally put to rest when we interviewed Linda Harris, one of the top Ty designers of Attic Treasures.

As veteran collectors know, there were at least five recognized designers of the Attic Treasures including Ty Warner, Ruth Fraser, Nola Hart, Anne Nickels and Linda Harris.  Sally Winey has also acknowledged and signed many of the Attics as her own designs at shows across the country making her a sixth but not officially acknowledged Attic designer. The concept of buying an affordable artist designed bear is what drew so many of us bear collectors to the Attic line, and although Ty Warner seems to have slipped away from his original practice of using individual artisans to design bears, many collectors still seek out the Attics designed by these original artists to add to their collections.  A few months ago we had the privilege to interview designers Nola Hart, Ruth Fraser and Sally Winey for the December Beanie Mania Issue.  So many pieces to the puzzle of the Attic Treasures have fallen together over the past two years, but there were still a few puzzle parts that remained to be answered- a few that only Linda Harris could piece together for us. In this issue we interview Linda Harris at length about her role in the world of Attic Treasures. We learned many things and apparently, Linda did, as well  We were surprised to discover in our initial conversation that Linda had been unaware until very recently, of just how popular her Ty designs had become.  In fact… just a few short months ago she donated a basket of Woolie Golds for a school raffle, and now, somewhere in Canada, an unknown student who won the basket, is sitting on a veritable ‘gold’ mine!

Linda Harris, one of the original Attic designers for Ty, inc., was born in Canada and attended the University of York.  She holds a degree in Visual Arts and is currently an elementary school teacher.  She still resides in Canada with her family, which includes  a grown daughter and a son at the University.  Linda Harris began designing and creating teddy bears after taking a class in 1987.   Although she enjoyed the experience, she wasn’t fond of the materials or the design that the class provided, so she decided to try her own hand at creating a bear from scratch. The very first bear she created received top honors at the “Cambridge Doll Lovers Society Show” in Canada..  This first bear was really a pair of bears, a cotton and velvet teddy named Duncan, who received his name after being unceremoniously dunked in tea to darken his color.  Duncan was accompanied by his own small teddy bear and a well- loved security blanket.   Excited by the new hobby, and motivated by her early success, Linda began designing and creating additional bears. She sold them on consignment through a small Canadian bear shop called “Teddy Bear Garden” owned by none other than fellow teddy bear designers, Ruth Fraser and Nola Hart.  Other well-known Canadian artists including Sue McKay, Hana Franklin and Joan Links also exhibited and sold their bears from this shop.  Each bear that Linda designed was a unique, one-of-a kind creation.  Linda’s artist bears are “all hand stitched and wear antique clothing and flowers, silk or antique ribbons and their accessories are vintage or custom made.”  The bears sold very well and Ms. Harris began receiving accolades for her creations.  One of her earliest bears won the prestigious Toby award and another was nominated for the Golden Teddy award.

At about this time, Ty Warner, was looking around for bear artists to help him with his new line of plush.  The new line would be named Attic Treasures and Ty visualized small bears styled to look like older bears from yesteryear.  It was, at the time, a unique idea for a large plush manufacturer to utilize and credit established Teddy Bear artisans.  Mr. Warner was introduced to Ruth Fraser and Nola Hart on a visit to their shop with the Canadian Distributor for Ty, Bill Harlow.   Ty chose many patterns including original patterns and designs by Ruth Fraser, Nola Hart and Linda Harris.  He then took these patterns to his factories in China and had the seamstresses work with them to create easy to manufacture  prototypes. Linda Harris and Nola Hart later met with Ty Warner at the Toronto Airport upon his return from China.  He carried with him the first finished prototypes.  Linda Harris was able to see some of her original designs now remade as manufactured bears.  Some of the prototypes that would later be produced included Woolie Gold, Tiny Tim, Gilbert, Digby, Clifford, Tyler, Abby, Oscar, and Wee Willie.  One prototype that would never reach production, but who DID reach the Ty 1993 Catalog, was Woolie Cinnamon (which is how Linda refers to Woolie Brown)  Linda was disappointed because she felt that the Cinnamon Woolie was much more attractive and consequently much more marketable than Woolie Gold. 

Linda Harris still has many of these original prototypes she helped to create. The manufactured products taken from these prototypes have changed a bit through the generations.  Some of the changes have been by design, while others occurred purely by accident.  Changes in fabrics and small deviations in style are credited to production runs and seamstress variations.  Changes in structure and overall design are generally deliberate changes that have occurred because of feedback from retailers and the buying public.

The Woolies were based on one of Linda Harris’ original designs named Guthrie.  Guthrie was a little larger than the Woolies and was a hand sewn bear of hand dyed mohair.  The Woolies ended up being too difficult to produce due to difficulties with the fabric and subsequent quality control problems. The wool fabric used on the Woolies is known to attract moths, so truly mint Woolies are becoming harder and harder to find.   Linda does confirm that only about four of the Woolie “Cinnamon” or Brown- as collector’s know him attics were ever made. We do know, however,  that many Woolie Brown hang tags were produced as they were sometimes found attached to first generation Whiskers the cats.   Linda still has Guthrie and the original Woolie Gold and Woolie Cinnamon prototypes in her personal collection.  Many of the photographs used to illustrate this article are of her own personal collection.

The bears Digby, Clifford and Tyler were all originally designed and manufactured with a humpback.  The humpback, however, did not go over well at the New York Toy Fair where they were first unveiled.  As a result, later versions of these Attics were produced with straight backs, although an occasional humpback in later generations can be found - most likely due to quality control issues.  There are slight changes in fabric colors and textures in these bears which help collectors differentiate between the earliest generations and those produced later on. Linda was able to confirm information that we previously reported  from Nola Hart regarding Clifford’s neck ribbon.  Linda Harris states that the neck ribbon was always green.  Clifford was never manufactured with different color ribbons despite persistent rumors to the contrary.  These rumors likely arose from the pictures of Clifford in the early 1993 Ty catalog  showing him wearing a red neck ribbon. 

Tiny Tim is a bit more fawn brown in his earliest incarnation and turned more beige in subsequent production runs.  Additionally, early Tiny Tim’s forehead is much broader and his ears are slightly larger.   Wee Willie underwent a design change as well.  Originally released with rust colored embroidery highlights, he was later redesigned with black stitched highlights.  Abby and Oscar, thought by many novice collectors to be Nola Hart designs due to their similarity in appearance to Cassie and Malcolm, are, in actuality, designs by Linda Harris.  Abby and Oscar share the same fur material, shaved snouts and lack of paw stitching as Cassie and Malcolm, but if you look beyond the facade, you’ll see that structurally, they are very different.  Linda Harris also designed both Gilbert White, and Gilbert Gold.  This statement from Ms. Harris  can finally lay to rest once and for all, the mystery of Gilbert White.  He was NOT a mistake nor was he supposed to be Nicholas.   Both White and Gold versions of Gilbert were produced.  Adding to the confusion, both were produced during the same time frame.  Gilbert White retired very quickly and a new white bear, with the same style number of 6015, named Nicholas, was manufactured instead.  In all likelihood, the name change was a result of it being too confusing to have two bears on the market at the same time with the same name. 

Four of the earliest Attics had special “artist edition tush tags”.  These tags were red and white and had a facsimile of the artist’s signature.  Two of these Attics, Sara and Jeremy, incorrectly have these tags with Linda Harris’ signature.  These were not her designs, and are according to Ty, inc., were, in fact, designed by Ty Warner, himself.  Some collectors speculate that the tags were meant to go on Woolie or Tiny Tim or Clifford, but an error obviously prevented them from reaching their intended destination.  All four of the artist edition tush tagged attics are among the most rare, and consequently, among the most valuable Attics in the entire collection.

In the last few years, Linda Harris took some time off from creating her unique one of a kind creations to care for her family.  A poll of Canadian teddy bear shops quickly reveals that no Linda Harris designed teddies are left on the shelves.. Each of her unique designs has long ago found a loving home.  Today, It is rare, if not impossible, to encounter one of her original designs on the market . Ms. Harris is seriously considering a return to her rewarding former vocation.  For now, teddy bear collectors from around the world will have to fervently hope that her return is imminent, and the Teddy Bear stores will once again have Linda Harris originals in their display cases.