[Report] The Untold History of Love Dolls: From Antarctic No. 1 to the Origins of the Dutch Wife

 

How did various genres of the sex industry and the items associated with them come into being? Nonfiction writer Mizuho Takagi explores their roots in Report: The Birth of the Sex Industry. In this installment, “Love Dolls and Onaholes” (Part 1), Takagi investigates the origins of Japanese love dolls, which are now praised as being on the level of fine craftsmanship.

Hohoemi: Born from a World-First Innovation

That day in Asakusa, Tokyo, Hideo Tsuchiya, then 30 years old and running an adult goods shop (adult shop) under Tsuchiya Trading Co., Ltd. (brand name: Orient Industry), commissioned Toho Mannequin in Katsushika, Tokyo, to produce a new type of sex substitute doll—a Dutch wife.

Toho Mannequin was a workshop that produced ventriloquist dummies and mannequin parts. As will be explained later, it was also a reputable factory known for creating the Dutch wife “Antarctic No. 1” for the Antarctic expedition that departed Japan in 1956. Until then, Dutch wives had simply been vinyl balloons with faces drawn on them.

Then in 1977, Orient Industry’s first Dutch wife, “Hohoemi” (“Smile”), was born. The company’s second president, Yuya Okamoto, recalls:

“To provide durability and just the right amount of elasticity, we reinforced the waist with soft urethane.”

It was the world’s first attempt to differentiate from other companies’ air-inflated or rigid-material dolls.

There’s also an anecdote behind the making of “Hohoemi.” As mentioned earlier, Dutch wives at the time were made of inflatable vinyl. One regular customer at Tsuchiya’s shop, who often bought Dutch wives, complained: “They leak air all the time.” When used in positions like missionary, the pressure from a human body caused air to escape. Tsuchiya would repair them at the counter each time, but fixing one spot would soon lead to another leak elsewhere. After this cycle repeated many times, Tsuchiya came up with an idea: urethanization.

“This way, there was much less risk of air leaks.”

When the regular customer saw “Hohoemi,” he smiled and said just that.

Inside the Love Doll Manufacturing Site

Afterward, Orient Industry absorbed Toho Mannequin and began full-scale production of Dutch wives—now widely known as love dolls. What were once vinyl inflatables have transformed into far more realistic, intricately crafted silicone products. How exactly are love dolls made? I visited Orient Industry to find out.

In Katsushika, Tokyo, an area crowded with small factories, stands the company’s workshop, which has been operating for 50 years, near Okudo General Sports Center.

At 3 p.m., guided by President Okamoto, I headed to the second floor where the dolls are made. Around ten craftsmen were working almost entirely by hand, handling silicone rubber. To form the doll’s body, they poured thick, liquid silicone into molds. Next, to harden the silicone, the filled molds were placed in a special kiln overnight for heating.

The following day, after the body had hardened overnight, it was removed from the mold, excess material was trimmed, and the surface carefully smoothed. Then came the painting process—body makeup.

Meanwhile, work on the head was carried out in parallel. Artificial eyes were set in place, and painstaking makeup was applied with great care.

Two full days after pouring the silicone, the body, head, and built-in onahole were joined together, and a doll that seemed to breathe with life was complete—ready to be delivered to customers.

“Because Hohoemi was still vinyl inflatable except for the face, chest, and waist, air leakage was unavoidable. Improving durability became the challenge moving forward,”

explains sculptor Nobuyuki Tsuruhisa.

From that desire to move beyond a waist reinforced with urethane to something stronger, the fully silicone Candy Girl was born in 2001. Making the most of silicone’s qualities, it was notable for replicating the beauty and feel of real human skin with astonishing detail.

“It was surprisingly well-received—100 units sold out immediately during the pre-order stage,”

says Okamoto of the doll’s popularity.

Tsuruhisa added about the development struggles and innovations:

“It took three years just for mold-making and skeletal design. By creating the mold with the body bent, we prevented unnatural creases.”

In 2013, the company released Yasuragi, modeled directly from a live model. It was known for its realistic detailing down to the fingertips.

From Azumagata Dolls to Antarctic No. 1

The use of Dutch wives as outlets for sexual needs in Japan dates back several centuries before the birth of Hohoemi, all the way to the Edo period. Because the private lives of the sons of daimyō and other feudal lords were strictly restricted, the Azumagata Doll was created—an artificial doll equipped with an azumagata (a sex device, essentially an onahole) made by stretching velvet inside a tortoiseshell casing.

The term azumagata contains the nuance of my wife, and thus referred to the form of my wife’s genitals.

Several records suggest that dolls like the Azumagata Doll continued to be produced. During the era of alternate attendance (sankin kōtai), when men were forced to live apart from their wives, they became essential. For instance, the 1678 publication Shikidō Ōkagami (The Great Mirror of the Way of Love), which depicted the life of courtesans, tells of a samurai, Hyōbu no Shin, who commissioned a craftsman to make an Azumagata Doll that closely resembled his wife. Much like prostitution in pleasure quarters, such dolls were already considered indispensable.

Looking abroad, in 1941 Adolf Hitler is said to have attempted to develop sex dolls for the Nazi SS as an alternative to prostitution, in order to prevent soldiers from contracting syphilis. At the time, more soldiers were incapacitated by venereal disease than by bullets. However, the project was abandoned before completion.

The former Imperial Japanese Army, composed mostly of young men, likely faced similar concerns.

In fact, before Hitler, a revolution in Dutch wife technology had already occurred in Japan. According to Life on the Battlefield of the Imperial Japanese Army (Gakken), the exact dates are unclear, but during the Taishō era (1912–1926), research and development of Dutch wives had begun at the Army Medical School. These included two types: Type A, which was shaped like a woman, and Type B, which consisted of only the genital area, both referred to as giji nyotai (“pseudo-female body”). By the Shōwa period, Type B evolved into the Dō Ningyō (“torso doll”), equipped with heating wires to give it warmth like human skin. Thus, the Dutch wife developed in parallel with the military’s efforts to manage soldiers’ sexual needs.

In 1957, when the first Japanese Antarctic expedition set out for overwintering (later dramatized in the film Antarctica), the problem of sexual relief for the team became a matter of discussion. This was when Antarctic No. 1 appeared, an object that has since become an icon in the history of Dutch wives.

Out of concern for the young expedition members, Antarctic No. 1—nicknamed “Benten-san”—was placed inside an igloo-style prefab hut. In reality, however, it seems it was never actually used. The widely spread story that the Antarctic expedition relied on Dutch wives (i.e., Antarctic No. 1) as sex aids is better understood as an urban legend.

As mentioned earlier, Antarctic No. 1 was built by Toho Mannequin. It was essentially a modified mannequin torso, equipped with an onahole made of rubber or plastic. A metal can was attached so that the waist and hips could be warmed with hot water. While it drew upon technology originally developed by the Army Medical School, in truth most of the components were produced by a private company and later provided after being seized by police.

Realism Alone Doesn’t Make a Better Doll

The beginning of fully silicone love dolls is generally traced to 1996, when the American company Abyss Creations was founded. Its president, Matt McMullen—also the vocalist of the hardcore band Chaotic Order—was, according to Tsuruhisa, a “Greatly influenced”. In 2017, the company went further, developing a realistic robot called the Sexbot, equipped with artificial intelligence that allowed it to talk and move like a human.

With AI-powered conversational functions advancing, Orient Industry is also exploring the possibility of communication-capable love dolls, determined not to be outdone by Abyss Creations. When I asked, “So, is there already a prototype?” an unexpected answer came back:

“At this stage, I have doubts about pursuing pure realism.” (Okamoto)

This is because, while users desire realism, they also place value on ideals and abstraction rather than complete fidelity to reality. In particular, Japanese men tend to carry two-dimensional ideals, so if something is too real, “it actually feels unsettling.”

For that reason, the company has pursued a luxury line based on the concept of pure innocence.

Visiting the showroom, I felt I understood their intent. The love dolls there gazed back with wide-eyed expressions—not quite like the fictional characters of manga, anime, or games, yet not exactly like real-world women either. What they embodied was the idealized vision of a woman imagined in one’s youth. Simply looking at them was enjoyable but imagining them as constant companions made it easy to see how they could enrich everyday life.

In the second installment, the focus shifts to the history of onaholes, introducing the material revolution sparked by subcontracted toy factories that led to their dramatic evolution:

[Part 2: Onaholes] The Dramatic Evolution Sparked by a Material Revolution from a Subcontracted Factory in Japan’s Toy-Making Town