RealDolls: Sex Doll Factory Abyss Creations Is Churning Out 10 Fake Girlfriends A Week

Developers are working overtime to create virtual reality porn, but the folks at Abyss Creations don't need the Oculus Rift developer kit. They've already created something that men (and a handful of women) can "interact" with sexually: the RealDoll, a lifelike, anatomically correct silicone sex doll with a completely accurate, fully articulated skeleton that arrives on a person's doorstep in a coffin-sized box.

Business is booming: Up to 10 RealDolls are shipped out of the evocatively named Abyss factory every week for a going rate of around $7,000 a doll, according to George Gurley, who visited Abyss factories for his article "Dawn of the Sexbots" in the May issue of Vanity Fair, on newsstands now. (You can get a brief video tour of Abyss Creations' factory here.)

RealDolls have been in the media for some time.

Since HBO's "Real Sex" aired a RealDolls episode in 1999, the silicone gal pals have shown up on TV shows including "My Strange Addiction," "Sons of Anarchy" and in 2007's "Lars and the Real Girl," a feature film starring Ryan Gosling as a shy man who has a relationship with a RealDoll. And for anyone who's fallen into YouTube's darker corners, there's the 2007 BBC documentary "Guys and Dolls," which introduced viewers to RealDolls and the men who love them, including DaveCat, who was later profiled in the Atlantic sharing details about his (apparently) polyamorous relationships with two RealDolls, wife Sidore and mistress Elena.

For the Vanity Fair article, Gurley visited the hidden uncanny valley ranch outside of San Diego to meet both Matt McMullen, the artist and entrepreneur who created the RealDoll two decades ago, and the man who recently became the owner of RealDolls, David Mills, author of the highly lauded book "Atheist Universe: The Thinking Person's Answer to Christian Fundamentalism," who has eschewed relationships with real women.

"My fundamental personality conflict is that I really like women but I don't like to be around people," Mills told Gurley.

McMullen, who used to be in a grunge band, fell upon creating RealDolls when he was working on a highly realistic, posable mannequin as a "funky art piece." He eventually sold the dolls in 1997 for $3,500 -- catching the eye of Howard Stern, who proclaimed sex with one was the best he'd ever had.

The dolls start off as a secret recipe of silicone poured into a mold. After they dry, they're washed, given anatomically correct body parts, airbrushed and topped with skull caps and heads. Buyers can choose from 11 body types and 31 faces, according to Gurley, along with skin tone, hair color and more intimate detailed customization.

It takes three months to create a doll, and buyers run the gamut. Not only the lovelorn and socially maladjusted buy RealDolls, but even the rich and beautiful (and perhaps socially maladjusted) buy them. Gurley writes that one celebrity with an anger management problem owns five RealDolls and even sunbathes with them on his yacht.

There isn't a RealDoll "type," Gurley reports. Fewer than 10 percent of customers are women.

And although McMullen won't create dolls in the likeness of celebrities, there are RealDolls representing porn studio Wicked Pictures' stars. Jessica Drake, who co-starred in a RealDolls-centered porn film, "2040," even calls some customers who buy Jessica Drake RealDolls on the phone and has sent a few of them outfits, reports Gurley.

Abyss is in the early stage of developing a RealDoll that will eventually be animated and have emotional intelligence, but McMullen tells Gurley he prefers the "old-school-ness" of his original RealDoll because he believes that what makes it special happens in the owners' imagination. But just in case, he has started a separate company dedicated to doll robotics.