#but hoping we can wear a matching coord or something with these!

[jichanxo]

matching kuromi and my melody necklaces for me and a friend :) pendants/acrylic charms are by @/ami.pokes

[beauetjoile]

Can you Thrift "Real" Lolita Items?

The simple answer is yes. I have heard many stories of coming across an Angelic Pretty or Baby the Stars Shine Bright item before. You're more likely to find something from Taobao as those prices are cheaper and harder to get a ping on with a Google search.

Today I just scored these:

Cotton Candy Feet batwing shoes. Paid $44 including tax. They were tagged $75 but since I'm an employee I got a discount.

I also helped the shoe pricer put a fair price on them because resellers are an issue and we thrift store employees are, quite frankly, getting tired of the same faces every day scouring for deals to resell online. We want everyone to have a shot at getting some good goods.

There is a matching purse and due to Rules™ I cannot buy until monday. I hope it's still there after the weekend. If not, no huge loss. I really don't NEED another bag but I needed lolita shoes.

They are a fraction too big but that's what shoe inserts are for.

HOW do you score lolithrift?

Well, it's luck mostly. A coworker happened to bring the bag and shoes over when they came in. I was privy to insider info BUT they were still available for the public for 48 hours. When I go back to look for the bag I'm also going to look for clothes and other accessories, because where there are shoes and bags there may be other coord items. Another tip is to just know where to go. Some chain stores get more oddball items than others, like my local Amvets tends to get more unusual items sent to them as collected by their warehouses and distributed for sale. Try and shop away from colleges, as well. Many lolitas are in their 20s and they are also the ones more likely to snap up cute things for Instagram likes even if they aren't into the fashion.

Edit: I have the bag

Is it matchy-matchy? No. I didn't realize the glitter pieces were Halloween limited edition. Unlike the shoes this has a little wear but it's fine. I'm still happy at $45 including tax. I didn't find anything else interesting except for a lavender cross enamel pin but I don't really do crosses so I left it.

[anna-neko]

organizing some files, thinking about International Lolita Day and just... fell down a bit of a rabbit hole which then turned into an existential crisis....

mah dudes, it's one thing when joke "have DVDs older than you" but ... but... but... have a Gothic Lolita burando piece that isn't just "older than you been into this fashion" (not condescending, plz keep at it!), *rubs bridge of nose* this was not an EGL Comm Sales nor LaceMarket "vintage"/second-hand buy THIS WAS BOUGHT BRAND-NEW AT ORIGINAL RELEASE (in dark ages when buying direct-from-Japan needed either u knowing this One Girl on LJ who was going on a trip, or jumping 20hoops for a shopping service! (which was just another lady living in Japan at the time) and hoping they'd spot the piece u wanted) This specific brand, bless, deemed us worthy of international shipping BUT ANYWAY rambles are boring, lets look at pretty pictures instead shall we

Meta calls this piece simply "Gingham Check Tiered Skirt" (ギンガムチェックティアードスカート) seasonal collections or pieces getting fancy names that are sometimes absolutely random girl names or bad engrish translation is a fairly new phenomenon, sometimes a literal description is best

✧ 2005 did u think I was kidding about its age was gifted this lovely skirt, and literally just ... pulled whatever was black/white to wear it out immediately! Hilariously, getting the big butt-bow tied was A Challenge: he couldn't do it because boys can't bows, I couldn't because can't see what doing behind me, his mom couldn't help because she didn't raise girls so out of bows-tying practice....

✦ 2006 - Disney trip, of course brought it We did Lilo and Stitch breakfast and Every. Single. Time. Stitch passed me, he'd tug on the skirt's bow *taps hairbow* made it myself to go with the skirt! (using the very proper GosuLoli Sewing patterns mook no less!) and every couple years a friend send me his FB memories snap he took of me with Princess Jasmine in this, and we both cry over the date

an otaku pilgrimage stop on drive back

✷ 2007 ya hear of burando~whores? Well have we got a treat then a full Meta coord: blouse, skirt and headdress!

something something pale vampire

♡ 2008 One Braincell, Much Frills

very smart ladies freezing in the New England snows, send help. Also, as can clearly see, now with a matching gingham headdress (still Metamorphose, this "brand wh0re" business ain't a joke)

and then went on a trip to London and you freakin bet this was packed along! fondest memory was absolutely fangirling over a life-sized DALEK statue in a bookshop, and someone came up to tell me, "your outfit's brilliant"

♪ 2009 how cool are my loli~friends? We dressed up to go play RockBand and mofo at-home DDR! all you kids with your TikToks and ...and... Zooms.... u will never be this cool

Fun fact: that headdress from before? The tiny bows were detachable! So could use them as separate hairclips for other looks

♫ 2010 - do not think anyone comprehends just how FULL this skirt is! It's 3 gathered tiers, and that bottom one is freakin miles of fabric. Plus the waist ties, and full lining with tulle sewn in

♠ 2011 are you tired of this nonsense yet? 'cause it keeps a~goin!

♢2014 oooh bit of a skip! did own a lot of other pretty dresses, skirt was packed away for a bit fun fact: am actually freezing in NYC winter outdoors.... we went to see a play staring Sir Ian McKellen & Sir Patrick Stewart!!

and finally 2022, on the most freakin FREEZING negative-degrees day in January we went out for honeytoast and I was like .. ya know what... oldskool coord!

is my skirt old enough to drive? ... yes... yes it is.... As always, hope everyone enjoyed and for the love of Mana, don't do the math... OMFG plz don't even try to math this one out

Not writing up coord break-down, other "brands" featured are in no particular order: Fan+Friend, Baby the Stars Shine Bright, rando shit from HotTopic and Kohls (or as the kids say "off brand"), LipService, Bodyline, Secret Shop, Innocent World, AnnaHouse and a bunch of cute Etsy jewelry bits

[little1too1dramatic]

1st Week; 5 pieces that every Lolita wardrobe should have, regardless of style

Hii ʕ ᵔᴥᵔ ʔ, 

As research for this challenge, I went through my oldest blog and found out that this is actually the third time I´m attempting this. And that I actually forgot what my first lolita piece was, but that´s a story for another time. I didn´t want to go for the obvious - petticoat, white blouse, etc. What do you consider universal essentials? 1. Earmuffs Can you tell that I´m freezing right now? :D Earmuffs are not always practical. They get in a way, you can´t hear through them, and at least I hate using them at the same time as my headphones. Unfortunately, they are so damn cute. And accesible. And I feel like they balance every outfit out so nicely. You have nothing to put on your head? You don´t feel like doing an elaborate hairdo? Well, if it´s cold outside, here are earmuffs! 2. Fan If you have the oposite problem, a fan might help you. Simple black, pink, or one with patterns can be easy to get. You can go for more elaborate one, almost like from Versailles. Some european courts even had a fan language – you can learn some phrases with you friends and use it at meetups, just make sure no one else understands before you sign anything scandalous! :D

3. Brooches You wanted to be casual, but not so casual? Or you don´t feel OTT enough, yet your arms, neck and head don´t have any spare space? Well, cute brooche is your best friend. You can go for elegant pearls, little leaf (I do think about Fellowship of the Ring a lot) or something outragiously extravagant, it´s up to you! And since not everyone wears them, it can gather some attention from fellow lolitas and maybe even become a great conversation starter.

4. Go-to headpiece I feel like I covered this with earmuffs, but I think this is way more helpful whole year around. Do you have any piece, as simple as can be, that you always just throw on? It doesn´t have to go with every single one of your pieces, but it would be helpful. For me, it used to be Margaretha Head Bow, now I prefer simple black headbows. It can be a small bonnet, head-eating bow, or anything that makes your coords feel more complete.

5. Huge collection of socks and tighs I used to hate getting those under Christmastree, now I specifically request this every year. It´s just so helpful! Not just simple black OTKs in many pairs, but colourful (remember the red thighs trend?), with patterns, lace even… not to mention few matching ones if you are into prints. I think that everyone, even outside the lolita spectrum should have a collection of sock and tighs!

Source

Right now, Paris is getting a little bit warmer. Which is nice, but I´m still looking for new black blazer. It´s such a staple of 80s goth. I already have at least three coats, so it will be a nice change. 

Even chilly weather can´t stop us from having a picnic. I went this Monday, maybe chatched a flu, but it was worth it! We went to Jardin de Luxembourg and then to Gibert, this nice 5 floor bookshop. They had amazing renditions of classics as Metamorphosis from Kafka and even a Dracula, but I bought French conversation instead.  Then we had another picnic near Seina, complete with a jazz band playing behind us. I don´t know if I have ever felt so peaceful.

I hope you are doing good! What is your favourite thing about autumn?

[trynadollsiesplay]

Rant ahead! You have been warned! I'm am not sorry. I needed to share.

Expressions Explored: Neon Shadow - Hope You're Not Afraid of the Dark

(Why, you ask? because... wtf do they mean and why are they here? What are these expressions trying to tell us as the audience? Why do they look... like that? 😬)

(Note: This is a long rant by someone who might not know everything about these topics amazingly well. But if you want to dig with me about why these faces are weird, here is my thought process. You're welcome. 🤪☺😉😅😊)

Expression 1: ...is this person in pain?

The eyebrows are pulled in, as if she is confused. The tops curve back down, probably under the hair. Chaotic eyebrows? 🤨

The make up might be hiding any change of expression the eye shape and eye wrinkles are trying to convey, because these eyes look like normal eyes to me. No changed or visible emotional expression within them. I can pretend they're the chaotic eyes the twins make in prior, but matched with her eyebrows this doesn't make much sense to me.

...

Expression 2: Mara's scream

Why is she making this face? Like, if she enjoyed making this sound, it might make sense. I'm not seeing any laugh lines though. There doesn't appear to be a spark of joy in her eyes. It looks like she's making a smirky face with her mouth open. But even then the expression isn't at all one sided, and a smirk isn't a smirk one sided. Could be a hidden sneer, but still... It just looks wrong / weird.

I'm also no expert, but by smiling that would change the sound of the scream she makes. The sound we hear is more of an 'aouh' scream, but that's definitely an 'aaah' kind of mouth shape. So she's actually lip sinking badly over a recorded scream. Or something like that.

Her face almost looks like the face someone would make while screaming, but with a smile. It sort of looks wrong. At least, to me it does. It's weird.

Expression 3: Flat Smooth

The vocals are too smooth here. If she was growling a little more, then the eyebrows might make more sense to the expression. Like, getting the feelings out. But typically when you're expressing things though that singing, the mouth shape would change (I'm walking around whisper shouting in my house to get what's going on. Feel free to try it with me).

Like in the Johnny Depp versus Amber Heard trials, the muscles in Ambers cheeks gave her away on the first day. Your cheek muscles drop when you're feeling down. Shouting typically happens when your cheek muscles are dropped, because you are, yelling, typically agressively or in fear.

In this case, the cheek muscles are up, because she's smiling, and not shouting. But then the eyebrows look out of place. Why are they down? You could say they were fake smiling or sneering, but the facial muscles and the lack of eye scrunching gives it away.

I'm trying to make this expression in a mirror. The only way I can achieve it is by raising my eyebrows. So either they've painted their eyebrows in artificial places, which doesn't yet seem plausible. Or the expressions aren't realistic. This might explain why people say these expressions are similar to those of nightmares.

Expression 4: What's going on in your head? (psst, I think she's mad)

Once again, to keep your eyes that open your eyebrows would be... lifted. I'm pretty sure. I'm not a professional, don't quote us here. But why is she making that expression here.

From what I have seen of guitar performances, a lot of guitar players are filmed looking at their instruments to confirm their coords. Even without that, it seems this would have to be a practiced face, and it doesn't make sense why you'd practice it for this specific place in the song.

Expression 5: With the Hero Pose

Apart from how that face is impossible for humans to make, as already discussed above, this face appears to be an open eyed sneering face. Like what the popular mean girl would stereotypically wear, except really fake looking. But this is added with the visible hero pose.

It's like the song is saying "whose coming to get you? It's us!" But the actual number shows no malicious intent to whoever they're coming to get. They have no enemy. So why the sneer and hero pose? I could understand a look of pride, apprehension, or a winners smile, but this expression doesn't actually suit what is going on in the number. Which makes it... striking, yeah sure. But also creepy and weird (and nightmare like).

I could understand if a semi finalist felt pride, or anger, or dedication to this song. But not, mad smile~ This seems really fake and unrealistic. Sure, aesthetic, but assuming this is for kids (as it says on YouTube, it is) it doesn't make sense. Angry expressions on rock bands for kids. This kind of music is about more than being angry and cool. It's about expression, making a statement and not being silenced. So the messaging here is wrong, along with the actual face.

Expression 6: Who are you looking at and why?!

It's like the animators wants to remind you that Uma (the blue haired one) was indeed still relevant and "coming to get you" too. But she's smiling and not actually looking at the camera. Like, she doesn't look scary and dangerous (unless unreal or insane is what you're going for...😅)

In other words... Uma doesn't look committed to what she's threatening, and she isn't putting on a confident winners act. The position she is in is typically that of the buff, focused guitarist beside the lead. But she doesn't look scary. She looks like a kawaii emo girl that couldn't harm a fly and has no intention too. So I don't understand why this face is here? It almost feels uncanonical.

You could say this is an angry face, but if you look at it for more than two seconds, to me it starts to look completely fake and empty. Just saying.

Expression 7: Never expected... such madness...?

Is that smile curved unnaturally high? Or is it just me? Either way, I am sensing Harley Quinn vibes. The camera is moving around so much. It's entertaining but it hides how weird and wrong the girls faces look.

If you look at the hair under Mara's chin, it looks like head should be tilted up, a camera angle that would make it feel like she was towering over you. But instead she's just a little taller than you, smiling weirdly. Again, why?There's not really any valid point (apart from aesthetics) I can think of. Solid pass.

Also, Crazy Pinky Pie vibes are in here too. I'm not really into mlp. But I've seen enough to say they look very similar here. 😕

Expression 8: Might as well be as close to realism as we get in this music video.

So, the eyebrows are up! I've been ranting about how that should have been happening the whole video. But then... her eyes aren't crinkled underneath. And the sides of her eyes are so high up. It's like I've taken a badly drawn background picture from any generic anime... but this is the central person on the camera.

Why does it look like this?

9. Final Notes: Credit where it's due.

Animation isn't easy. Making rock music for kids whilst keeping it looking edgy, is hard. I don't know how long the animation team got on this, but overall each frame looks high quality. It's just the little things that are really putting me off.

I imagine these videos are things they expect fans to watch over and over again. And I just don't think this is what someone would want to see. It's too nightmare-ish and cringe. Especially when you can watch the video without this animation behind it on YouTube. Maybe people like it's unique weird qualities, and because there are so many short snippets you could reuse it in the series.

So, by rights, this is fine and passable.

But, if you bat an eyelid at it, if you think about it. If you're looking to watch a unique animated music video and not just the Rainbow High Shadow High franchise... this isn't a video I'd be looking for. It's uniquely got lots of issues.

So, really, this rant was unnecessary. Ignore me, lol.

But now you can see why I don't like it. And why I wish there was more work done to polish it right. I wish they would fix it, but I know they don't have time, which is sad. Like... I don't want to say wasted potential, because it is good. But it's sad to see it like this. These characters, and the artfourm they represent, deserved better representation than this. I'm a little scared this will build on the stereotype of scary people in rock bands. It's really too short too. But it's still there. Bad stereotypes. I wish they were gone, so we could see the true beauty laying there, right infront of us. Just hidden under the final surface. One proper polishing away.

[griffintail]

The First Day

Summary: Your first day on the server.

Pairing: Wilbur Soot x F! Reader

Next

Warnings: Swearing

A/N: This is a story I was working on in my free time for like the longest time and it's still not finished and it's so long. God knows how many parts this will be. I need a title for this story too. I'll think of one separately and it will have it's own masterlist if people like it. 

SO! Without further ado, here you are because I was bored!

Oh and (Y/U/N) means YOUR USERNAME.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

        Wilbur logged on to the Dream SMP. He didn’t have anything to do there, it was just a place to run around and build for him at the moment.

        He had built his “ball” not far from Tommy’s base, maybe he could build something else…He wasn’t quite sure yet. Just as before, Tommy begged for his attention and chuckled at the boy’s antics quietly. As he was going to find a space to build a new name joined the server.

        (Y/U/N) joined the game

        He frowned. He’s never heard that name before. Someone must have though because Dream didn’t let just anyone on the server. He’d look into them later.

        He was once more about to go to work when there was a new message in chat.

        <(Y/U/N)> There are new people on today. \o/ Hello, Mr. Soot and Mr. Innit.

        He chuckled as he read the message deciding to give them a response, smirking at Tommy’s probably rage.

        <WilburSoot> Hello there! :)

        <(Y/U/N)> May I know your coords?

        <WilburSoot> You may

        He gave the newcomer he coordinates, deciding to stick around the ball as he had as Tommy messaged him with renewed hope. A figure that wasn’t Tommy climbed up to Wilbur. The character was a female skin in a plaid jacket that was open with a plaid shirt and blue jeans to match, wearing a gray beanie on blonde hair.

        <(Y/U/N)> Hi! I’m new and wanted to give you a gift.

        She threw a flower, a poppy specifically, at him and when he picked it up, he noticed it was named.

        From (Y/U/N) to WilburSoot

        <WilburSoot> Why thank you Ms. (Y/U/N).

        <Tommyinnit> WOMAN!?

        <(Y/U/N)> No problem good day!

        <(Y/U/N)> Mr. Innit! May I have your coords?

        <Tommyinnit> No I will not give a woman my coordinates!!

        <(Y/U/N)> :(

        And now was the time to respond to Tommy. Wilbur logged onto the discord and joined Tommy in his call.

        “Wilbur!”

        “Now Tommy, that’s not how you talk to a lady.” Wilbur jokingly scolded him. “Apologize to her.”

        “I am not going to apologize to a woman!”

        “Tommy,” Wilbur warned. “Don’t make me block you.”

        He heard Tommy sigh exasperated and typed in chat.

        <Tommyinnit> I’m sorry

        <(Y/U/N)> :) It’s ok. I wish to give you a gift! Coords pls?

        <WilburSoot> He lives in those fences right across from here

        “Good, thank you, Tommy.”

        “Will you talk to me now?” Tommy asked with a huff.

        “Sure.”

        He first went into his ball as the girl sprinted over to Tommy’s place. He put the flower in a chest before following after her as he listened to Tommy talk.

        “Why the hell did she give me a flower?” Tommy questioned as Wilbur was halfway to Tommy’s.

        <Tommyinnit> Why the hell did you give me a flower?

        <(Y/U/N)> I’m new and I just want to give you a welcome gift!

        <(Y/U/N)> I need to work on my house. Good day, Mr. Soot and Mr. Innit!

        She sprinted away towards the community house. Wilbur stopped next to Tommy as he was holding a red tulip.

        “Wha…What was that?” Tommy asked Wilbur.

        “She told you, now what do you want to do?”

        The new girl had left before Tommy’s stream ended and after Tommy’s stream and he left, Wilbur decided to look up who the new person was. Looking up the name, he got a Twitter, YouTube, and Twitch account. On her Twitch there was a new video streamed today titled “Let’s not be homeless! (DreamSMP)”. She had a decent amount of followers on her Twitch and her YouTube channel, she had half a million subscribers. On her Twitter, there was a picture of a dog with its face pressed against the camera that had taken it. There was a tweet from not long ago with a full picture of the same dog next to a desk.

                                                     -------

        (Y/U/N) @(Y/U/N)

        He wouldn’t leave me alone all stream! I love my good boy but a girl needs her space!

                                                     -------

        Wilbur gave a quiet chuckle before liking the post and giving her a follow. Maybe he’d meet more of her…

                                                      -------

        Wilbur logged into the server once more to work on his project to come with Tommy. There were a few people online, Tubbo, Ponk, and Fundy. He didn’t bother them though, giving greetings back when given before getting to work. As he did, he got a notification from his phone that someone was live and glanced over. (Y/U/N) was live.

        Curious, he pulled up her stream and decided to leave it on in the background.

        “Hello, magical people! We’re going to be jumping back onto the SMP! My house looks so dull and I wanna find wolves.”

        Wilbur caught her accent immediately, American, definitely.

        “What do you mean there’s three people I haven’t met! I don’t have experience chat! Don’t say that!”

        (Y/U/N) joined the game

        “Fudge there’s three people I haven’t met. Firetrucks, uhhhh, I need to give them their flowers but I can’t name them!”

        <(Y/U/N)> Hello new fellows! \o/

        <Tubbo_> Hello! o/

        “I like that one.” She laughed. “He definitely deserves a flower. Oh, Mr. Soot’s online. Maybe he can help…”

        Wilbur looked over to see her typing a message in chat to him and as he looked over, he realized there was no webcam. She must not like to show her face.

        (Y/U/N) whispers to WilburSoot: Hi Mr. Soot! I’m in a predicament. May I ask for some of your EXP levels to name three flowers?

        He chuckled as he typed back to her.

        WilburSoot whispers to (Y/U/N): I have a few I can spare. I’ll be heading over to the ball to meet you. Just bring the anvil and flowers.

        “He’s a lifesaver chat!” She cheered. “We found a good one!”

        He laughed as he made his way over to his ball.

        (Y/U/N) whispers to WilburSoot: You’re a lifesaver! I and the chat thank you!

        She came sprinting over a few moments after he got there and she placed the anvil down and threw to him a dandelion, an orange tulip, and an allium.

        (Y/U/N) whispers to WilburSoot: The dandelion for Tubbo, the tulip for Fundy, and allium for Ponk.

        WilburSoot whispers to (Y/U/N): Ok :)

        He named the flowers the same as she had named his as she took the chance of waiting to read out her subs and donations. As he named the last flower, he saw he had a spare daisy in his inventory. She was giving them flowers; he should give one back.

        To (Y/U/N) From WilburSoot

        He threw all the flowers back over as she was reading a donation.

        “Ah! Flowers! Time to hunt down the people!”

        (Y/U/N) whispers to WilburSoot: Thank you! I owe you one!

        WilburSoot whispers to (Y/U/N): Any time!

        She picked up the anvil before sprinting off into the distance and he went back towards his build.

        <(Y/U/N)> Mr. Tubbo! Hello! I’m new and wish to give you a present!

        <Tubbo_> Thank you!!

        It was a moment before a new message popped up in chat.

        <(Y/U/N)> Hello Mr. Fundy! I have a gift for you!

        <ItsFundy> Ah thank you very much!

        Wilbur found it rather interesting as he watched the chat about how she used titles to talk to others. It was rather formal.

        “What do you mean there’s an extra flower? I only gave Mr. Soot three. Ok, ok, I’ll look.” She told her chat. “I thought I taught you guys better.” He looked over as she looked through her inventory, hovering over the extra flower he had given her. “Oh! He gave me a flower back! No one’s ever given me a flower back! Two years of giving flowers to people on servers and Mr. Soot beats them all!”

        So, this was a regular bit she did. He was surprised though to hear that he was the only one to give her a flower back, blushing lightly at her off-hand compliment.

        <(Y/U/N)> Mr. Soot! Thank you for MY gift! :)

        <WilburSoot> It was no problem. :)

        “Now back on track! To Ponk’s!”

        Wilbur tuned out the in-game chat as he worked, looking towards his phone though when he heard his name.

        “Do I watch Mr. Soot? Well yes, I’ve watched a few of his videos with Jschlatt and I’ve listened to his music video, uh…The Internet Ruined Me! That’s the one.”

        Wilbur blushed lightly once more. She had watched some of his videos and his music?

        “Do you watch anyone else on the server? Yeah, I watch a few of the guys like Sir Dream, George, and Sapnap. I watched one or two videos of Mr. Innit’s and Tubbo’s creation. But I have to be here with you too chat! I don’t have time to watch everyone!”

        Wilbur finished building, about to log off for the day but stopped and opened in-game chat.

        <WilburSoot> Good bye Ms. (Y/U/N)!

        “And he’s saying bye to me! Why didn’t we meet him sooner chat?!”

        <(Y/U/N)> Goodbye Mr. Soot! :)

        “I am not simping chat! I thought I taught all of you better!”

        Wilbur laughed as he turned off the stream. She was certainly a character.

[queensparklekitten]

OK I hope you don't mind me adding on to your post about the aikatsu system but omg

yuuki aine of aifure has a goal to make as many friends as she possibly can, and does so with ease. so much so that if she ever faces an issue (i.e. short staffed in a theater bit) she can call as many as she needs and of course, they'll come to help her

at first it's just a cute charm point thing about her personality, but later on, mio says aine's friendships hold a special power, their "frienergy"

aine and mio essentially use this to win the diamond friends tournament in season one?? which of course could be considering cheating if we look at this seriously, a rookie idol and her barely more professional partner beating love me tear after only a year spent training for it? that aside though, this means aine, or, possibly thousands of people she's befriended, all hold this magic power to do...something

is aine giving these people powers? does she not have this power herself, can she only grant it? and if she's the one giving it to them, that means that after discovering she can do this this, she's making a conscious decision to keep using this to propel her career forward??

that sounds dark and I adore aine, so I don't want to go there but like. wowie

so aine possesses actually legitimate magical friendship powers. well in season 2, in order to help free alicia's kingdom from a seemingly endless and severe blizzard, the girls travel there to perform lives and cheer up the people there while hibiki tries to repair her friendship with alicia.

they defeat the blizzard by using the power of friendship, singing, and a big dramatic scene where they all ask the storm to go away. and it does?? it just goes away and everything returns to normal

this season also introduces the jewel coords that, much like star wings, choose idols to wear them. so the aikatsu system's back at it again with the sentience ig

there was also this one episode of aifure where maika, ema, kaguya & sakuya stumble upon an actual magic artifact that causes the units to shuffle over and over and it felt so weird like. ok aikatsu is just confirming, in their own words, magic is at least real in this world/season

kiseki raki can somehow just make jewel dresses and star wings! this is either pure luck or some sort of msgic she herself possesses, but it's strange to see idols in aipara just..accept this, as if they've seen someone just do that on their own before.

when aipara first came out that made me wonder, who actually makes the star wings and jewel coords? the wings always perfectly match the coords, could there be people with the same magic as raki making them for the system?

Is the aikatsu system actually does have this little pocket dimension, could people with powers similar to raki be creating the wings that it grants to idols, or are they purely spawned by the system itself? if so, the system is an extremely talented designer ngl

this would also mean the jewel coords are specifically designed by the system in aifure. these coords embody an idol's spirit and personality, the system clearly knows them well if it designs them itself, this means it's possible that either;

the system already knows who it will grant these coords to. maybe they haven't debuted yet even, it's just waiting. it's already got the coords ready.

every idol has a potential jewel coord but only a select few are actually unlocked

or, they're generated randomly the second the system decides it's time to give them to the idol

normal jewel coords are granted mid-performance, unlike raki's, and the original coord the idol was wearing morphs into said jewel one. when they finish performing, they look at their cards, and they've changed to the new coord. does this mean the old one is just gone?? the previous coord is always a PR, this means either a PR has just disappeared completely and an out-of-aikatsu real world card set has been overwritten by the system, or that the system somehow transports the original cards someone, possibly back into their cardbook

ogkatsu really didn't dive into magic stuff much, aside from the stuff you covered in stars lore with the reality-bending stages and filming and all. yurika is not actually a vampire and they make a point of it, she's just really good at staying in character. sakuea's not really a fairy, sora does seem to have some mysterious magic stuff going on but it's rarely used more than once, and never addressed so there's not much there

this is so long but. I have been collecting these thoughts for way too long

if you already knew the stars stuff sorry!! I think its like well known stars lore but I didn't know how much you knew already 😅

[millepara]

the show news left me feeling like an abandoned cat in a cardboard box, but I finally got the will to scour news articles for info about the arcade game, and it seems... kind of promising? I still wonder where the gameplay video they promised in the announcement is, because I’m sure it will make a lot clear... until then, here’s what I've gathered.

first, the cabinet. the big obvious one (well, aside from the touchscreen) is the bottom opening previously labeled “card exit” is now the “Swing exit”, for yet another confirmation that there are no cards in Aikatsu Planet. on the other hand, there might be a two-player mode, as labeled in tiny text by the coin slot!

the top has a lot going on--there’s what I think is a scanner for your Aikatsu License on the top right. there’s a big white panel in the middle that appears to only be a place to set your Swings, as seen in the very bottom of this photo:

there are also these three slots to scan Swings sticking out in the middle. at first I thought it could be for different coord parts (dress/shoes/etc), but looking at this screenshot:

I think it actually corresponds to the three parts of your “Battle Stage” (Opening Battle on the left, Main Battle in the middle, Climax Battle on the right). so maybe you wear up to three dresses in one game? unfortunately I know so little about the game that it’s hard to say--is this three parts of one song (with three costume changes in it?!)? or do you get to play 3 whole songs instead of 1 now? regardless, I still don’t see anything indicating we can mix and match coord parts.

still, the Swings are quite large--they could have a QR code on the back to scan, which means the scanners might be able to read aikatsu cards too. I’m going to remain hopeful for now. 🤡

there’s also a photo of these Swing... wallets... cases? albums??

those look like four different idol types to me. Meltyhouse sounds like a brand name, too, but there’s only one designer confirmed so far (Sala) so who knows. the Swings don’t have brand or type info on them, so this is all speculation.

I’m relieved that the Meltyhouse one (Shiori’s? though that’s Ruli holding it in the screenshot up there) is pretty obviously pop-type or whatever the Planet equivalent is, though, because none of the characters looked pop-type at all.

next, Swings. not much to say here: they’re cute and the design/Dressiers remind me of Clow Cards (but not aikatsu). they’ve showed PR, R, and N rarities, and they’re divided into “Fairy” and “Jewel” types so far. also, about 30 Dressiers(/Swings) will be released per part!

next, gameplay! I thought it was just acting for the cm, but it turns out you actually high-five your character to start your game! kind of cool, kind of makes me fear slapping my entire palm on a dirty screen after forgetting to wipe it first, as mentioned in that one ask.

like so! this is also our very first look at a mychara (!!!). of course, this is Aikatsu-chan, meaning she’s using the starter mychara parts. it’s a big image change.

I can tell there are definitely ways that the graphics have improved (check out the focusing in the screenshot at the top!!), but I find Aikatsu Planet’s look overall to be so clean that it feels flattened out completely--like on the shading of the hair, for example? is that just me? I know it’s not my imagination that they made the arms skinnier, though the rest of the proportions look the same. (hopefully I get over this soon enough.)

anyway, in each of the three parts of the rhythm game, you have a Dressier Chance, which is where you “beat your rival to wear a dress,” as the cm says.

it looks like this when you are successful. (I wonder if there is the chance that you are not successful, and instead have to wear that shapeless offwhite thing for your whole performance...) still very much unknown is how many coords you wear per game. it is nice to know both characters can dress up at the same time, which was something I worried about after hearing that “beat your rival” bit.

finally, the rhythm game itself: you tap the screen in time with the music, pretty simple. but aside from being unable to use aikatsu cards, my other big fear about Aikatsu Planet is that the rhythm game won’t be challenging (the main reason I prefer Aikatsu to Prichan)... one article has a quote saying you can “enjoy the rhythm game with intuitive operation thanks to the touchscreen,” which could be just some words but could mean they intend to keep higher difficulties? who knows.

one last mystery: your final score is apparently decided by both your rhythm game score and your “compatibility with your opponent’s Dressier.” what? why your opponent’s Dressier?? ... here’s hoping we don’t have to wait till December to find out the answers to this and all other questions!!

(sources: 1, 2, 3)

[20dollarlolita]

A few thoughts about sewing your own lolita as a beginner lolita.

First of all, I want you to read the other part of this story, where I talked about the things I think are important for new lolita wearers to know. I’m aware that it’s about three thousand words and a bit of a chunk to read, but being a new lolita is about doing research on your own to avoid making common mistakes, so get ready to do some reading.

This post is going to build on those ideas. Before you can make anything, you need to know what to make, which brings us back to the most basic elements of a lolita coord:

Something on your head

garments that cover your shoulders

dress or skirt that can handle the lolita shape

petticoat

something to cover your legs

an extra something to make your outfit more than the pure basics.

So now our goal is how to get those things. If you’re going the handmade route, you’re going to be creating a lot of it yourself. So, where do we start?

Going to stick a jump here because this one will also probably be long.

Okay, so first of all, research is important for all lolita, but it is absolutely crucial for handmade lolita. You’re going to need to research general lolita, specific elements, how they work together, what elements go into the elements, and a bunch more.

The reason you have to do more research is that if you’re buying an existing piece, it’ll either work for lolita, or it won’t. If you’re making a piece, every individual element of the piece has the chance to not work. You can have a good blouse ruined by bad lace. You can have a nice hair accessory design sabotaged by fabric choice. If you’re making your first lolita piece, you’re going to need a really good grasp of what you’re trying to sew and what you’re trying to match.

This can be particularly difficult if you’re just going off online pictures. If you’re a learn-by-doing kind of person, trying to accurately copy items you can’t touch is a special challenge.

Because of this, I think that even if you’re dedicated to handmade lolita, you should buy a premade lolita piece to include in your first coordinate. I like to suggest buying a premade blouse, and building the coordinate around that.

I suggest blouses for many reasons. First, they’re significantly less expensive than going all in and buying a dress. Second, they’re more difficult to make than making a lolita skirt or JSK, so buying one is a better option for new sewers. Third, premade blouses are heavily detailed, which gets you a hands-on look at lace, ruffles, spacing of details, kind of fabric, and general design motifs.

If you find a blouse that you like, and build an outfit around that, you’ll have a grounding point that you can use to influence your design, which helps you get a better sense of consistency. It’s easier to attempt to find a lace that matches a lace you have, rather than just stare at the trim wall at your fabric superstore and hope the one you got was right.

Blouses are reused in numerous coords, so you can wear the same blouse with different skirts or JSKs and have variety in your wardrobe without having to rebuild your first coordinate from scratch.

Finding a lolita-acceptable blouse out in the wild land of normie clothes is actually extremely difficult. You can find ones that are okaaaay, or you can modify one, but you have much better chance of getting the look you want with a bought blouse.

Finally, blouses are already complex things with sleeves and sleeve bands and cuffs and princess seams and darts and plackets and buttonholes and buttons. Unless you’ve done a lot of sewing, making a plain and basic blouse is going to be difficult, even with a pattern. If you’re not already familiar with that, you’re going to be making an moderate-advanced difficulty garment in a style you’re not familiar with, with rules you don’t know, with details that you’re just guessing at. Having success on the first try with that level of handicap is going to be really difficult. You can spend $36 on the materials for a blouse, mess it up, buy $36 more of material, and end up spending $72 on a blouse that you’re not sure about and might have to remake when you’re more experienced. You can also spend $54 on a blouse and $16 in shipping and end up spending $70 on a blouse that you know will work and that can provide a foundation point and a reference for your future wardrobe. 

Have I sold you on my plan yet?

Even if you’re not going to buy your blouse, because you’re courageous and want to jump in, you are going to need to be shopping around in legitimate lolita websites, because you’re going to need to know what you want to make.

Here’s 13 stock images of blouses that I compiled from legitimate lolita sellers. When you’re buying your own lolita, it’s obviously important to be looking only at legitimate brands and resellers. However, when you’re learning how to make your own, it’s equally important to be looking at legitimate sellers who actually know what they’re making or selling.

While you can use those images as your research, I definitely recommend looking for your own reference images that you like, because your tastes and mine are different. Check out blouses on Lolibrary, Wunderwelt, Closet Child, Clobba, and DevilInspired for starters. Not one of those; all of those. Save pictures of your favorites. Bookmark listings you like. (Each of those potholed links takes you to that site’s blouse listing specifically, so you don’t need to search their sites)

If you’re researching lolita to make or to buy, you should probably have an idea of what subtype you feel drawn to and what brands are in that subtype. Head over to Wunderwelt or Closet Child and see what’s for sale from that brand. Starting off your lolita trip with a piece from your current favorite brand is a really good direction to start in.

And, if not, you’re going to want to find yourself a picture of an actual garment with a bunch of details, so that you can copy all of those as best you can. Get a look at the lace, the back, the front, the buttons, and the overall proportioning. 

Once you’ve got your blouse, or at least have a really, really firm idea of what kind of blouse you will eventually want to make (and seriously, if at ALL possible, buy that blouse), it’s time to talk about

***

ACTUALLY MAKING something

I don’t know if I’ve made this clear but if you want to make lolita and you don’t want to do a lot of research, you’re not going to make successful lolita. Remember what I was saying about researching your blouse before you make/buy it?

Well, get ready to do that about all of those things in the lolita checklist. 

80% of making your own lolita is just researching a lot of lolita. If you’re not in the researching mood, just remind yourself that you’re learning what these things cost to buy, which lets you feel extra smug when you make a very similar thing for 1/10th the price.

However, when you’re making things, it’s helpful to change your focus. You’re not researching blouses or JSKs or bows. What you want to do is get familiar with the fabrics available for you to buy (at the fabric store, online, etc) and research items that are made of similar fabrics.

For example, here’s a board where all the items both were made by Angelic Pretty and look like fabric from my fabric store:

Again, you can use mine, but you also want to do your own research. When you look these up, you’ll be able to see front and back views and close ups of the lace. These extra details that I can’t put into a 1000x1000px file are things you want to come up with yourself.

So, if you start focusing your research on lolita pieces that look like fabric you have access to, you won’t encounter the problem of not being able to find fabric for the design you want. Don’t worry. There’s plenty of time for you to not be able to find the right fabric later, on your second or third or fourth handmade coord. Make things easy for yourself this time and pick something you have easy access to. If you feel the need to make things hard, get started on sourcing all the lace you’ll need for this.

***

So, once you think you know something about what you want to make, and are semi-confident that it won’t involve purchasing specialty textiles, it’s time to start looking at the details of what to actually make.

Please remember that if you start this step without actually doing your research, you’re going to waste a lot of fabric, labor, and probably money on a dress that will make people say, “Bless your heart,” and not “that’s great lolita, and I can’t believe that it’s handmade!” You will get Bless Your Heart’d regardless of your raw sewing skill, if you haven’t done the foundational research.

(Note for non-english-speaking audience and maybe non-USAers: “Bless your heart” isn’t a good comment to get. It’s an emotion that exists somewhere between “you tried” and “i can’t believe something this silly is actually happening and I’m being forced to witness it”)

But now that you have made yourself aware of what lolita looks like, the details, the proportioning, and the so on, we get to go onward.

What kind of fabric do I use? What kind of lace is good? What patterns should I use? Where do I get them?

These are pretty easy answers, once you’ve armed yourself with the knowledge of what you’re trying to make and the world it exists in. I’m going to answer them in pretty fast, kind of simplified answers. The more you get involved in this, the more you learn that some of what I’m saying will be the wrong advice for what you’re doing. A lot of fabrics are like the Master Sword: when you’re more experienced, you can try it, but you’re not ready until you’ve had that actual experience. So let’s just jump in:

What kind of fabric should I use? 

(Disclaimer, I’m going to use the names of certain lines of fabric available at Joann Fabric and Crafts, because I know them. I’m not endorsing shopping there to the exclusion of all else. I’m just already there 37 hours a week for no benefits and so I’m pretty familiar with what they carry)

Okay, so, in the past, the main answer was a midweight cotton twill. Now, the answer has gotten more complex, with a lot more major brands offering dressed printed on polyester.

The main concerns are weight and drape. If you use unlined quilt cotton or one of the lightweight ginghams (joann homespuns collection), the bodice of a dress will make the wrong shape, and the skirt will not hang correctly. If you have heavier trim like lace or ruffles on the hem, it will distort slightly under the shape. Because of this, if you’re using a plainweave cotton that’s designed for quilting or a more lightweight fabric, lining or flat-lining the bodice and regular lining the skirt with something smooth and tightly-woven can seriously improve the look of the dress. Most shirtings or high quality muslins work well for this. To flat-line, for each pattern piece of your bodice, cut one of the face fabric and one of the lining fabric. Stack the two corresponding pieces together, and sew them together around the edges at about 1/4″ in from the edge. Then, treat them as one piece. To line a skirt, make one skirt of your face fabric and one skirt about 2″ shorter of your lining fabric. Stack them and sew the top edge together, then treat them as one piece.

What kind of lace should I use?

Okay, here’s where owning your premade blouse would help, if you got it. Take it into the fabric store and just try to match the lace visually. Keep texture and thickness into consideration.

Don’t have any? To oversimplify, here’s what you need to know:

Decent-looking Venise lace is going to be your best option. This lace is detailed, thick, textured, not made on a mesh background, and expensive. This is in the $7-$25/yard if you’re getting it at my fabric store. This stuff most closely matches most lace off your big B Brand garments.

Second-best is embroidered lace (or mesh lace if you’re at JAF), where a soft tulle background has had textured embroidered patterns applied to it. This is the kind of lace that is on a lot of wedding dresses. It can get up there in price ($6-$15/yd) but it’s often cheaper than venise lace. The reason this isn’t usually as good of an overall lace is that it often looks strange when it’s not gathered, its floppiness makes it harder to see the lace details, and the mesh background means there’s not as sharp of a contrast between the lace details and the color of your garment, which can cause a visual loss of detail.

Third comes cluny lace, which is a thick crocheted-looking lace (actually a bobbin lace made of about 15-40 strands braided together). It’s usually 100% cotton, so you have to be careful when you wash it or it’ll shrink. This stuff is much less expensive ($2-$10/yd). It’s not considered as great of a lace because, while the contrast is good, the lace itself isn’t as delicate or detailed. This stuff is a more budget lace and the community knows it. However, I find it’s got the best balance of delicacy and price for most of my handmade stuff, and it’s a pretty good lace for your first dress if you’re not trying to match anything.

After that is eyelet lace, which is basically embroidered cotton fabric that has little holes worked into it. Eyelet lace is chunky, cute, eye-catching, and inexpensive. Because so much of it is opaque fabric relative to how few holes they are, eyelet lace is like a hybrid between a fabric ruffle and a lace. Much like cluny lace, this lace is known for being less expensive, but it still looks lovely. It’s very rare to find an application for eyelet where it’s applied flat, so try to get gathered eyelet unless you know for sure where you’re applying it on the garment.

And after that is the dreaded raschel lace. Good quality lolita lace has a nice visual contrast between the lace and the fabric it’s applied to. It’s got a thickness to it that provides texture to the pieces it’s applied to. Raschel lace is paper thin, no texture, and knitted onto a mesh so that it always looks muddy against a colored background. Raschel lace is cheap, cheap, cheap, and it’s often found on $15 dresses from Wish. Stay away from it.

You’re probably going to go to the fabric superstore and realize that most of your lace options are available in white and no other color. You can either design your first dress or skirt around white lace, or you can get some cotton lace and a bottle of dye and dye it the color you need. Make sure to dye all your lace at the same time unless you have plans for a two-tone effect. However, in your research, you probably noticed that white lace is also the most popular color for most lolita dresses, so that should save you some time and effort.

Moving on.

What are good lolita patterns?

There’s sort of two mindsets for how to come up with a dress. Some people like to have a pattern that they, using the instructions in the pattern and a good selection of fabric, can make a lolita dress. We’re going to call this the “grandma, can you sew this for me?” strategy.

There’s also the strategy of taking numerous small parts of other patterns, combined with some eyeballing and a tutorial that starts out with “using a marker, draw directly on the fabric,” and frainkensteininging a dress out of that. We’re going to call this the “I’m probably a cosplayer and I do what I want” strategy.

So, if you’re going to be giving your good fabric and trim selections to a relative to sew them, or if you’re learning to sew and are following along the instructions very closely, there’s a couple of patterns that I own and that I know will get you usable lolita in the end.

If you are drawn to dresses with an a-line shape and a smooth midsection with no seam, like these:

The the best pattern I know of at the moment is Simplicity 8127:

You will need to exercise discretion with how large you make the bows and where you apply them.

And no, none of us know why they decided to photoshop her hair green.

If you’re making a more conventional lolita dress with a waist seam,

like these dresses with waist seams, and you want an actual lolita pattern that tells you where to put things, the best answers I’ve found so far are the Simplicity 8444:

Which has a heck of a backstory but is probably the most coherent lolita pattern out there (because the original designs were stolen, like I said, heck of a backstory) that you can get at a brick and mortar store,

and also Cosplay By McCall’s Manikin:

which is harder to find, but has better instructions and gives you a more flexible dress in the end.

While you will need to be smart about what fabrics you get, what trim you get, and how you build the dress, all three of those patterns can get you functional lolita with almost no modification.

***

If you’re going the I AM A COSPLAYER AND I NEED NO PATTERNS route, get yourself a copy of New Look 6390 and a ruler.

Start with view C. Don’t make the skirt. Find a tutorial for a lolita skirt and attach the top of it to the dress like it’s the waistband. Decorate.

***

But that all sounds really hard.

If you’re a beginner, and you want to sew your own lolita because you’re afraid of the price, but you’re not all that confident at sewing, the good news is that lolita skirts are super easy to make.

Not sure? Start out by making your petticoat. This tutorial is a pretty easy method, and it gets you used to cutting, measuring, and gathering. If you can make this, and it’s the right shape, you’re ready to make a skirt.

A basic rectangle skirt is just a rectangle with some math and an added zipper. The rest is decoration. If you can’t install a zipper elegantly, but you can put velcro in your skirt in an invisible way, you can use velcro. In the end, a carefully built, nicely decorated lolita skirt where everything hangs evenly will be more in line with lolita than a fully-decorated JSK made from a pattern but constructed without care for symmetry.

Pair it with your blouse, and go back to the other post for advice on shoes. Use your leftover fabric and trim for a bow, and you’re pretty much there.

So, in conclusion, research a bunch, shop smart, and construct it with care and precision. Show people what you made! Tell them it’s your first! Be ready to accept critique, or else warn people that you don’t want to receive it. Remember that when someone in a critique group offers you advice, it’s not because you’re bad. It’s because someone’s taking the time to help you to learn. Learning from others helps you save a lot of time and money by avoiding mistakes that other people made for you.

If you have any questions, you can send them to this blog or to my instagram at @apollygz, and I’ll answer them whenever I get a chance!

Don’t let this wall of text scare you off from trying out lolita fashion!

[verdantstylus]

Tokyo Street Styling: The Aesthetics of Japanese Street Fashion

a.k.a. why do some outfits have a ‘very Japanese’ aesthetic and others don’t?

If you’ve ever scrolled through the TokyoFashion instagram, you’d see outfits of all types and styles, ranging from the ‘classic’ harajuku staples like decora and lolita to the more street-style based coords of which an overall style is yet to be properly named.

Over the years that I’ve been an observer and a follower of these styles, I’ve noticed a gradual but significant decrease in actual Japanese people wearing the ‘classic’ sub-styles and more and more venturing into the realm of the nameless umbrella which is ‘tokyo street fashion’.

And yet harajuku fashion isn’t really dying, it’s transforming into something completely new (mentioned in this post). And what interests me the most is how these new styles are so different from the so-called OG sub-styles and yet are distinctly Japanese.

So this post will attempt to talk about that in as short of a post as I can manage

This other post already mentions the basics of Japanese street style so I won’t go over that in much detail again.

❀❀❀

First, a quick background of Japanese colours.

Japanese colours in the Edo period were originally split into three categories:

The Colours of Animals

The Botanical Colours

The Colours of Nature

And these colours in varying proportions would evoke certain seasons or feelings. Some colours are tied to spring, others to autumn. And borrowing from confucianism and taosim, there are colours that are tied to specific elements.

Nowadays, these are not completely strictly adhered to, since the West introduced their own colour theory after the Edo period, but there is a lot of the original colour theory of Japan that is still relevant in their aesthetics today.

Sources: 1, 2

❀❀❀

Next, a quick introduction to some of the main concepts of Japanese aesthetics:

♔ Wabi-sabi

The idea of embracing transience and change, but also imperfection and incomplete objects, as it is natural. Think of the sakura that only blooms for a short while, the idea of things growing, flowering and then decaying, and finding beauty and peace in that process is part of wabi-sabi.

♔ Yūgen

Referring to “something dim, deep and mysterious, something that cannot be understood”. The Japanese also don’t believe this feeling can be expressed in words, but I think the closest explanation is a sense of profound melancholy and gentle grace.

(Think of mode, karasuzoku, outfits by Rei Kawakubo, can possibly be applied to mori kei)

♔ Iki

A combination of intellectuality and sensibility. It is simplicity and sophistication, or maybe even sophistication in simplicity. It refers to the unselfconscious, measured and straightforward. It usually is used to relate to a person, but we shall see how it applies to fashion in a bit.

(Mori kei is the first thing that comes to mind, but also pop kei and classic lolita)

♔ Shibui

The aesthetic of simplicity and unobtrusiveness. Shibui refers to things that are overall simple, but when observed more closely are detailed and textured and refined. It has a balance of complexity and simplicity.

And of course the most important one to this context:

♔ Kawaii

The concept of cuteness and being loveable, found in most Japanese street fashion.

I find that these, in their various combinations and proportions, make up a lot of what is Tokyo Street Fashion.

Sources: 1, Aesthetics of Colours in Japanese Paintings and Woodblock Prints in the Edo Period (Siying Wang)

❀❀❀

So. How does this all apply to fashion?

I’m going to use some examples here to describe what I mean.

♔ Strawberry Candy Outfit

I call this the strawberry candy outfit because it is indeed the colours of a strawberry candy. So outfit breakdown: why is this an example of Japanese street fashion?

Firstly, the use of layering textures and sheers is a common part of Tokyo street style, as well as the use of colour blocking. The overall colour palette is based around pink, so the makeup and accessories would match that, and the blueish-grey of the hair and the blue accents on the shoes and the earrings provide the littlest bit of contrast.

So colourwise, I’ve decided to use pink as my main colour, and the red, white and grey are all secondary to that, though by playing with proportion, I can ‘even out’ the amount of pink and make it less overwhelming. Pink is made of red and white, so I broke apart the red and white, and then added grey to make the look more neutral, but also feminine.

The main aesthetic concepts I am following here are Shibui and Kawaii. There’s an overall cute energy that comes from the bows, red tulle and pearls. And yet it’s a very balanced look, not overly cute. The idea is to play with the textures and patterns to give it more dimension.

♔ The Utilitarian Office Lady

This coord is based around a monochrome palette, the suit is made of a pair of flared trousers and a boxy jacket, which on its own can make a cool base for a karasuzoku outfit or a mode outfit.

But here I layered the suit jacket over another jacket of reflective grey fabric, with a lot of utilitarian elements to it, and also added a plastic belt with grommets punched into it. The hair could just be a really long sleek ponytail, and the faux reptile skin backpack and dark makeup would go nicely to give it more of a street-style edge. The shoes are black Nike Kyrie 6 EPs but really any chunky black sneaker will do.

This one is more following the aesthetics of Shibui and Iki. It’s unobtrusive in the way that it is sleek and monochromatic, but it’s also very detailed in all the contracting sheen and texture of the outfit. The matte suede of the suit with the reflective polyester of the jacket, as well as the reptile skin and the mesh. There’s a subtle contrast there.

This outfit, I would say is very straightforward and simple, but there are so many interesting layers about it that give it more dimension and personality.

♔ The Edgy Gyaru

This outfit is inspired by the modern gyaru. The sheer top can easily be paired with a shorter skirt and knee high boots to be Even More Gyaru, but I’m going with this skirt because I find it more interesting. This outfit leans more towards the Rokku Gyaru sub-style, and would go with light ash grey coloured hair and the typical gyaru makeup.

This look is a mostly Iki sort of aesthetic. There’s a sexier type of sophistication in this look, and it’s mostly in dark muted colours, but the details make it far more interesting than it first seems.

This is the most ‘mild’ of the looks I’ve shown here, and it’s largely because this one has the most western influence. This look will be a lot more tokyo street with the makeup and the hair styling factored in, but just as it is, it’s actually more of a blank slate.

❀❀❀

If you’ve read this far, thank you! It’s been a long post, but to conclude:

The world is becoming very interconnected and very globalised. Which is great for spreading word of a style or a trend, not so great for maintaining the so called ‘purity’ of that style or trend. And as styles and trends progress over time, they can die out, they can change into something new, and I am of the opinion that that change should be welcomed.

However, we can’t forget where the original trend came from or where the style evolved to add another layer on top of an older trend or to completely reject it and become something even newer and unseen.

Other countries and cultures have been adopting Japanese aesthetics into their street culture ever since the ‘big 3’ of Japanese designers were introduced to the world in the 80s. There are elements of Japanese street style in Parisian and New York streetwear, just as there are western influences in Japanese street style.

In fact South Korean, Chinese and Japanese street style is becoming more and more homogenous, and sometimes it takes me a while to even figure out where the specific outfit i’m about to share is from.

I hope this post was helpful in explaining how to spot the core aesthetics that make Japanese fashion so Japanese, and I hope you, my dear readers, can use this info to craft your own outfits.

The traditional Japanese colours and aesthetics aren’t a hard and fast rule, but if you want to dress more to the style, it’s a pretty good guideline to really ensure you’ve got the coord right. 

[venus-says]

Aikatsu on Parade! Episodes 01-05

It’s time to get this Parade on the road!

After a much-needed break, I feel like I'm ready to get back into writing about Aikatsu.

On Parade started roughly a month ago and like what has been usual I won't "dissect" each episode and I'll give a more general review of the first 4 episodes.

As a general overview On Parade is good. It's not brilliant or anything, it still feels like we're in Friends! territory, but it's fun once you let critical thinking aside. It's very obvious this is a series trying to cash in on nostalgia and more often than not shows with this premise can be annoying, but so far the nostalgia card hasn't been overused which's a huge plus.

From these 5 episodes, I have only five elements of the show that I really dislike.

The first two points are TOO MANY STAGES and TOO MANY RECYCLED MATERIAL. The performances on Aikatsu are usually the high point of the episode or at least the thing we expect the most, but the way they're doing it is just too much. I would rather see one stage, maybe two, per episode, with updated and consistent CG graphics, rather than three performances especially when there's really no need for that much. Episode 2 could've happened with just Mahiru and Yume&Mio's stages, Message of Rainbow and Your entrance were more than enough for Episode 3, we should've gotten a single Honey Cat performance (maybe You x I) to go along with Jalapeño's in Episode 4, and Identity should've been the only one we got in the Halloween episode. When you have that many stages it just feels like they're padding the episodes up, especially when they don't even bother to update the CG models. Like Akari had two completely different models in episode 5 and it was just SO WEIRD. I know CG is expensive, I know y'all are trying to play with nostalgia, but this just ain't fun.

The third one is regarding the special coords for this season. In the promotional stuff for the arcade, they make it seem like Legend Premium Rares are something SO SPECIAL, they transcend regular PRs, heck Ichigo's one looks like an evolved form of her first PR. But then episode 2 comes out and Yume pops on the stage with her special coord like if it was nothing and it bugged the hell out of me, it was just the same as Friends and the Jeweling Dresses, they don't feel special AT ALL. Now I'm more okay with it and It doesn't bother me as much, I still wish they had at least one scene of them saying how this coord came to exist but I'm already over this fact.

The fourth point is the whole basis of this show. When written down, a door appearing and the girls traveling to different schools seemed like a very fun concept, however, the execution has implications that once you stop for a minute to really think how things work your brain gets messed up. I know that this was probably the only way to make this work without messing up with past continuity, but this whole different worlds/dimensions thing IS SO COMPLICATED. I wish they were just traveling through space and they had retcon things to make the three shows fit in a single universe, rather than start messing up with this kind of stuff.

And the final point I have issues with is characters. First, the show seems to have got rid of any irrelevant character, I mean it was good because M4 hasn't appeared yet (THANK GOD), but like characters like Luka, that ended her season on a high position, weren't nowhere near the spotlight. I didn't expect this show to give any kind of development to characters that weren't the past main protagonists and Raki, and I'm totally fine with that. But even Raki has been lacking development. Don't get me wrong, I like Raki, but her personality is a huge double-edged sword and the fact that the show doesn't punish her for messing up turns her into a flat-lined and uninteresting character sometimes.

Another problem I have is with her dream, she says she wants to wear a PR she made, and the game already gave her a PR which means it'll probably be happening in the show very soon which implies she'll be reaching her goal before the half-point of the season. What I think they mean by that is that she wants to make a PR that's UNIQUE to her and she'll keep making PRs based on other idols coords until it happens, but if that's really the case they don't make a good job at making this clear. Now, Episode 6 seems that'll give her some development and I'm very hopeful to see it in action.

Despite all these flaws, there's a lot of things this show gets right.

I know I just said Raki is a problem, but she's also a solution. When she works she's amazing, she gives the best reaction faces EVER, and she can be very adorable, and from what we've seen from her sketchbook she can make lots of fun designs and I'm excited about it. Also, her mad scientist sister is a lot of fun, even though we've seen so little of her so far.

I can't deny that seeing the cross-generation interactions has been incredible so far, and we've even got some non-expected matches in these few episodes and they all work wonderfully! Yume and Mio sound like best partners, Aine and Ako were surprisingly very fun, Mirai and Akari were probably the most unexpected of the bunch but it was so magical! Honey Cat and Jalapeño was probably the most obvious interaction so far, but that's no detriment for the bond they make on that episode.

Another thing that to me is great is the fact that they don't forget what Raki's main thing is, we're always seeing her looking for inspiration, trying to learn about designing, and actually making her own stuff, that to me is an essential point to make me like Raki as much as I do.

I can't talk about Aikatsu without talking about music, and while we only got technically three new songs so far they've all been very good.

Your Entrance is a great OP, both as song and as the actual opening sequence, my favorite version is, of course, Raki's solo as an insert song, there's something about the lines "I know the end will never come / We will always be alright / I’m forever by your side / trust me as I trust you" that I really love, it gives me a certain desperation vibe, like if the producers are trying to say "THIS IS NOT THE END" and I just love it for some reason. The new ending isn't my favorite rendition of Idol Activities! but it still gives a warmth to my heart and the sequence while very simple is still very beautiful. Speaking of endings the returning rotational endings are a very nice touch. Yume and Mio's version of STARDOM is very good, it may be a sacrilege but I really think Mio and Yume work better together both musically and as characters than Aine&Mio and Yume&Rola ever did (sorry).

These are small things that I also like, first the show keeps the continuity of each series picking up more or less right after each one has ended, I like that other idols can get dragged by Raki's doors because it makes more dynamic, the girls don't need to be always moving to be able to meet new people and it also makes for more creative mix and matches of idols, and I also like that the aphorisms are back because of all ending segment we got this is the best one (I'm just glad the horrible card segment from Kagayaki no Jewel is gone tbh).

And these are pretty much my opinions on the first batch of episodes of Aikatsu on Parade! I feel like I complained a lot, but I'm still very pleased by this season and very excited for what's to come, there's a moment where they talk about achieving things with the help of other people and as much as I know they're probably talking about Raki learning from seeing others and learning to cooperate there's a part of me that's just so excited in hopes that it's a new character coming up and UGHHHH I LOVE THIS SO MUCH. I'm also very excited to see my faves again at some point, and I'm really hyped for the Mizuki x Elza x Hibiki collaboration they hinted at in the banner for the next wave of cards for the game, it'll be a lot of fun to see Yoko voicing Elza and Hibiki at the same time, I wish we could see backstage videos of that happening. XD

ANYWAY, I feel like I've talked way too much already. What are your thoughts about On Parade? Do you have any theories about how this Aikatsu multiverse things work? Is there anything you're excited to see? Please let me know, let's talk about it. See ya~

[greed-the-dorkalicious]

Anyway basically what I was saying is- and I mean this in the nicest way possible with no offense intended- if you can afford full lolita coords with accessories and the whole nine yards, that you actually really want and not just “well this is what I liked that was within my budget”, fuck you

...To put things more intelligently, what I mean is like... Sure, it’s not impossible to do lolita on a budget. It’s not even impossible to do nice lolita on a budget. But you can’t pretend you don’t have to cut some corners to do so. Like yeah, maybe you can get some pretty fabric and sew a nice skirt at home, and maybe you can get a nice Bodyline blouse for $30, and maybe you could find a pair of mary jane shoes that work for lolita at Target or Goodwill. You can certainly, with enough hard work, creativity, and luck, assemble some sort of lolita coord on a budget. In that sense, yes, lolita is doable on a budget.

But you can’t get exactly what you want. Handmade and Bodyline stuff is nice, sure, but come on- everyone’s looked at online shops and seen pages and pages of brand stuff and found at least a few things they really like, or a dream dress they’d kill to wear, and when you’re on a limited budget you just can’t normally get those sort of pieces. And sure, maybe if by some once-in-a-lifetime fucking miracle you might be able to find a brand piece that you like decently enough in your size for a price you can afford on lace market or something, but the odds of that are slim at best. And if a big brand releases a new piece that you’d absolutely die to have? Well, fuck you, buddy, do you have a couple hundred bucks sitting around in the bank to spend right away? I think the fuck not, bitch!

Not to mention the whole “a coord isn’t complete without accessories!!1!!11!!” thing; Most people would say an ideal outfit should include not only just the main body of the outfit, but also shoes, tights, jewelry, hair accessories, maybe a jacket of some sort, or gloves or little wrist ruffle things, all perfectly coordinated and matching with each other for a unified look. That’s kind of absurdly difficult to achieve on a low budget. Sometimes you don’t have the money for accessories after buying main pieces. Shoes and purses, as we know, are the work of the fucking devil because holy shit it is hard to find acceptable lolita shoes/purses at a cheap price AND in your shoe size, and being able to find multiple options so you can pair them with specific outfits? What the fuck?!?!? And then of course when it comes to jewelry and all that, well, here’s hoping if you look through the entirety of Claire’s you might find one necklace that you don’t hate and might at least sort of look alright with your outfit.

TL;DR Lolita on a budget isn’t impossible as a concept, no, but it’s kind of like looking at the Lego Death Star and then trying to build your own Death Star out of your family’s bin of assorted random lego bricks. You might be able to build a Death Star, maybe even one that’s cool and worth being proud of, but can you build the big fancy expensive one with all the whistles and bells that you’ve always wanted? Unfortunately, that’s just not possible.

[ladywiththegirlsheart]

bis pre-issue review★

The magazine itself is quite big, bigger than LARME and similar to the size of ViVi or Sweet. I like big magazines because bigger pictures (although scanning is a bit harder)! Also there’s 136 pages. 

The cover is okay, I’m not super crazy about it but it’s nice.

★

Anyways, looking inside, the main story is 「Never mind」which features the cover girl Mirai Shida. Like the cover, it’s quite dark and makes use of different layouts, borders and text layouts. The main theme is about being reborn.

The shoot advertises different trends like flare plants and chiffon dresses. The looks will set you back a couple tens or hundred of thousands of yen though, it’s not cheap. On the cover she is wearing a 410,000 yen dress by Rochas. However this shoot, and the first few in the first half of the magazine, are more likely for aesthetics and promoting ‘high fashion’ brands to try to emulate for yourself as the second half of the magazine balances out the price of items.

The next editorial is 「Gemini」. It advertises new collections from brands like Theatre Products and Jill Stuart along with some writing by Erika Kobayashi about twins. Like the first editorial it’s pricey with the aim of looking high fashion. I didn’t really love it and the photography was just okay to me.

Next was 「Vespertine」. There were one or two pictures I liked, but again it was just a high fashion-y sort of editorial with a little bit of superfluous text. And I didn’t really like the clothes. 

The last of the high fashion editorials was 「忘れる (Wasureru)」. This one was very artily edited, which focused more on aesthetic than the clothes. I wasn’t enamoured by this one either unfortunately. I think it would have been better without all the graphics around it. 

Next was 「UTOPIA MAKE-UP」. It’s about “Mode Feminine” make up, aimed at ladies becoming adults. The main header pictures were really creative and nice with a robotic twist, but the make up wasn’t to my taste - the cheeks are meant to be a skin tone colourless colour. The lip colours were reddy pinks though. The featured make up brands were Anna Sui, Yves Saint Laurent, Dior, Jill Stuart etc.

Now we come to the divide of the magazine. From here on out the magazine picked up a lot for me and was more affordable, bright and youthful. 

Starting with 「Summer Style of Vintage」a book in the magazine (like the little book in book things) which features some questionable fashion choices that nobody would be caught dead wearing - like a shoulder to toe lace bodysuit and a dress that looks like it was made out of blue cling film... But some of it is okay... take it with a grain of salt. Actually the last page promotes a magazine called DOOR which seems to have styled this, so it might just be some kind of PR.

Moving on, next in the little book segment is Products Needed This Summer. It features the model Raimu Taya, who seems to be the main ‘bis girl’. It shows the make up to do in different situations like daily make up and date make up, then shows you how to style your hair and makeup with certain coord items like cat eye sunglasses and bloomers. I actually liked this spread a lot, but wished it wasn’t all taken in front of a grey background, that, and lighting doesn’t make the make up look so great.

Next, a prettier layout for popular keywords for now. There’s even some coordinate examples, to give a taste of the fashion in bis. Some brands featured in this are HONEY MI HONEY, Zara, Supreme.La.La, Faline and Katie. There’s also keywords about skin care, cosmetics, nails and make up. 

Now back to the main magazine, my favourite editorial! 「Pretty Things」. It features Haruka Kudo (from Morning Musume ‘17), Raimu and Raika Yumi as three sisters working in a hair salon. The coordinates feature them wearing one of the same item of clothing or accessory and mix and matching with different pieces. It’s easily the best editorial showing different situations like “Selecting Flowers for (the) Salon” and “Scouting Pretty Girls”, and the fashion’s cute too. The most featured brands are Katie and Agnes b.

Next is a “healthy summer” mix and match, featuring Raimu in Vintage Casual and NANAMI in Girly Casual. Some of the brands featured include lilLily, Peach John, Uniqlo, Zara and Forever 21. It shows at most 5 coords for each style for the months between May and August. There’s some cute stuff, there’s some basic stuff. Layout wise it reminded me of ViVi.

Next is a feature on hairstyles for summer. Mostly before and afters promoting different hairdressers to visit and some styling tips. The fashion in this segment is quite nice. 

Next is another hair feature, but this time a hair arrange segment. My first thoughts were that it looks a lot like LARME. I don’t know if this ribbon hair stuff is popular in other magazines nowadays though, so it could be the norm. Anyways, it’s nicely laid out and the models are cute. 

Next is 「Self Body Care Salon」. If you’ve read something like this in another Japanese magazine you’ve probably read them all! There’s a lot of exercises, stretches, diet tips, massages etc in this part. The theme colour of the pages are baby blue which is really pretty. 

Next is the recipe segment. A part of this is also on the bis website. It’s recipes featuring noodles with 0 grams of carbohydrates. The instructions are limited to about 3 or 4 steps so I don’t know how easy they are to follow, but I genuinely want to eat them all.

Next is a make up Q&A. Again, read a make up Q&A once and you’ve read them all; but you do get some summer tips and bis make up recommendations. There’s a question on how to make your eyes look bigger without circle lenses, and flicking through the magazine it seems more often than not that circle lens aren’t used that much. 

Moving on to culture, it kicks off with a piece on a short movie that is being shown in the video section of bis’s website. I haven’t watched it yet, and I haven’t read the piece yet. 

The next page is on 「Transparents」- clear accessories. I guess this isn’t culture...but it’s just one random double page. There’s some expensive clear accessories which seem like they belong more in the beginning part of the magazine. I don’t know, really.

Next is some promo with Sanrio for Sanrio Puroland. It features some ‘bis girls’ - SAKURA, Noa Sato and Mei Tanaka. I’m not familiar with them, but they look quite young. You can see this PR feature on bis’s website too. 

Next there’s an interview with the title “Do you think birds are free?” It also has some illustrations. It’s quite long, so I haven’t read it yet. 

Next 「How to grow my wings」with Raimu. It’s a weird layout with text all over the place. I don’t understand it, but I think it’s supposed to be deep. It’s pretty at least.

Turn the page and there’s  「LAKE」. Another written piece about something...It’s from a story about travellers or something.

Anyways, coming towards the end, there’s 「BOY’S CULTURE MODE」. Which is an interview with Kento Nakajima, a member of Sexy Zone. I don’t know about Sexy Zone and I don’t really have any interest in it, so I didn’t read it. 

The first of the monthly instalments, 「bis BOOK 」. This month’s book is “Night Flower The Life and Art of Vali Myers”. The other is 「bis FLOWER」. This month’s flower is Dahlia. I like flowers, but I didn’t expect that to be something they’d do every issue. It’s different, that’s for sure. It’d be nice to have a model posing with the flowers though.

Then, fin, telling us the magazine will start to be published in September. 

★

My first impressions are that the magazine is not bad. But there’s a big disconnect within the magazine. The first half is Vogue x Sweet, the second half is LARME x ViVi. Since it’s only the pre issue, it can definitely be hard to get one original ‘bis’ style down of course. However if they maybe spaced out the high fashion parts, or just inserted some high-end pieces into the second half and vice versa, it would be better. It’s too much at the start and it’s boring. I like high fashion editorials but the pictures weren’t enough to make me feel like looking at them over and over again. 

The second half is nice, and has some pieces and coordinates I like. I can see it’s a bit more mature even if the models look young. 

I also think the very last part needs some work. The culture sections are lacking. 

Also, going back to my first impressions regarding the website; the magazine and the website are indeed different. Some things from the magazine are actually on the website in short articles, and some website articles don’t actually feature in the magazine. Everything related to appealing to boys only exists on the website and some of the outfits in the magazine actually go against what’s written on the website - baggy shapeless pants that hide your figure being something boys don’t like girls to wear is actually in coordinates in the magazine. It’s another example of disconnect, with the website giving a sort of different impression. The magazine is definitely more mature than the website.

But overall, as I said, the magazine needs some work. Luckily there’s a couple of months before the magazine launches to make changes. I also think it’s a little expensive. It’s a little less than Sweet which has over 350 pages and always comes with a gift, like a bag. Maybe they should give a gift with it, or maybe it will have more pages later on.

★

So, for the pre-issue that’s may overview and review. I’m not completely blown away, but it’s not a lost cause. Now’s the waiting game for Autumn! Thanks for reading and I hope this helped! Has anyone else got their issue? What are your thoughts and if you weren’t sure about bis do you think you’d be interested in getting it now? 

[millepara]

aikatsu stars episode 44 spoilers (also a lot of Koharu frustration)

wheres Koharu

I’m not fucking around this time the episode is literally called “haru no yokan♪” / “premonition of spring” where’s my fucking premonition of Koharu

Anna-sensei has really become a role model for Rola Only. in oldkatsu Johnny-sensei gave out guidance to all the girls pretty equally, but there’s like no Yume/Anna-sensei interaction... ofc Hime-senpai’s there for Yume Only and Rola and Anna-sensei definitely are in the same aesthetic genre so I get it, but honestly I like Anna-sensei a lot and I don’t like Rola at all so it’s unfortunate that I gotta see the one with the other all the time.......... . imo

there’s certainly no premonitions of Koharu in this op, is there!!

do Rola and Mahiru even have roommates...?

Mahiru just said the cocoa she made is sugar-free but the word for that is “nonsugar” in japanese and I forgot which kids’ idol anime I was watching for a second lmao

a Rola and Mahiru unit....voicewise that could turn out pretty good! I can’t imagine what song they’ll sing though... I could see them doing 1, 2, Sing For You but it’s pretty old now.

crocuses.... they’re lavender, like Koharu.....

( •᷄⌓•᷅ ) Honeybee Kiss... what a bad choice. I mean, I like that song a lot but it’s definitely for cute-type voices, and doesn’t show off Rola and Mahiru’s good and cool singing voices at all. I hope they at least get to wear coords that kind of remotely match the stage unlike SKY-GIRL’s One Step

was that Ako’s room they were printing in? does she seriously not have a roommate either? that’s so lazy of the writers.....

Yume and Ako made a Koharu snowman....... there’s my premonition I gues s. .. .... . I’m so angry

AHHH ROLA’S BLUSHING AT MAHIRU YES THIS IS THE GOOD AND PURE AIKATSU CONTENT IM HERE FOR

Yume shovels snow just like I do, ,

well, there’s two super wintery coords that have nothing to do with the flower-covered Honeybee Kiss stage. thanks again aistars

and I mean ofc they sound great bc they are just great singers but.... a cool- or sexy-type song would’ve sounded way better!!! agghgh I’m so frustrated it’s like aistars is trying to stunt the quality of its performances so we don’t get our expectations too high or something. meanwhile every oldkatsu post-cg-update performance was a fucking delight. do you remember the first time you saw eien no tomoshibi or Kira pata shining or Tarte tatin or Precious or ??? bc I absolutely do but I still haven’t gotten anything like that feeling from any aistars performance but Hime-senpai’s solo So Beautiful Story... almost

and the next ep is about Ako getting her glitter... does Lily have to get one too or can she just design her own dress??

(WHERES KOHARU)