Barbie honours Russia’s only female cosmonaut with its new doll

Barbie has produced a doll celebrating Russia’s only current female cosmonaut, Anna Kikina, Russian aerospace corporation Roscosmos has announced.

In a mission scheduled to take place during the fall of 2022, the 36-year-old will be the fourth woman to land into space. Created as part of Mattel’s “You Can Be Anything” role model campaign, the doll represents a Barbie-like version of Kikina, in two mini-costumes replicating the cosmonaut’s everyday blue uniform, and the beige space suit she might wear when she leaves the ground.

“I did not dream of becoming an astronaut when I was a child,” Kikina admitted. “But had I had a Barbie astronaut doll, then the idea of becoming one would have come to my mind even then.” She added, “Not every girl playing with such Barbie dolls needs to want to become an astronaut. The most important thing is that they all know that they have the right to choose any profession that they like.”

The single doll will be offered as a prize on 12 April, in a contest celebrating the 60th anniversary since Yuri Gagarin’s breakthrough as the first person to fly into space.

Previously, Barbie also released a doll representing Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman to go into space, in 1963.