Candy Life - Lolita Lifestyle

Trading Lolita for Ouji?!

4/15/2017

Hello and welcome back, it's been a while.

While collecting questions for my #AskHimezawa series, there was one that stood out in particular; "Have you stopped wearing Lolita?" and the answer to that isn't quite as simple. It's a yes, but it's also a no. I decided to make a full blogpost about it, so I can finally clear up a few things.

STYLE EVOLUTION & Getting Older

Let's dive right into the dreaded part; I'm not getting younger. While Lolita was a great hobby for me, especially collecting and set-item hunting at second-hand stores, my stale shifted drastically from Sweet to Classic and Gothic towards spring last year. During summer I got busier and busier and had little to no motivation dressing up fully in the heat. I wore mostly country and casual during last summer, and classic during the beginning of fall when I started cutting my hair shorter. After changing the color to grey I rarely put on dresses at all and started experimenting with other street fashion styles, mostly black outfits, hoodies, subtle Punk and Visual Kei elements.
Though I still wore Gothic Lolita and Otome Kei for my livestreams with Baby Wolf, in my spare time I resorted to Wego and casual outfits mostly containing skinny jeans and binders. It felt more comfortable and was just faster to put on. Meanwhile my hair went shorter and shorter. I never had the chance to wear super short hair in the past; When I was a student my parents dictated over how I had to dress and style my hair, when I went to college in England I had a bit more freedom, but hence it being an acting school I still had no real say in what my style said about me - We had a dress code and requirements of natural hair color and lengths for casting. I also joined my first agency for modelling and acting which didn't make it easier. They take your picture once and you have to look according to your profile for the term of your contract.
Only moving to Japan I had a little bit more freedom, especially whenever I was between agencies.

On another note I'd like to add that despite having a large collection of wigs thanks to my past years in Lolita and Cosplay, I am not wearing them as much anymore. In fact, I can't remember the last time I wore a wig in my private life... It's not that comfortable and unless I have chances of having my pictures taken I'd rather skip on the headaches.
When I still had my hair extentions - which I have gotten rid of, in case that wasn't obvious - I had no need for wigs. Though styling them took me a long time, it looked better, more natural and was easier to take care of. On the topic of extentions, I also got my eyelash extentions removed recently which was the most freeing experience I've had in a while! I used to crawl back to the salon every other week to get them fixed, couldn't wash my eyes during the time in-between, wasn't able to use eyeliner and don't even get started with how I went swimming... They made make-up a lot easier, but caused me a lot of trouble in the end. They were kind of essential to my Lolita fashion aesthetic, hence the overall appearance, but I guess I am back to glue-on lashes if I chose to put on a dress.

The "End" Of Harajuku Fashion

A fairly recent topic that came about was the change Harajuku and J-Fashion styles went under lately. With Fruits, Kera and Gothic Lolita Bible stopping print release a lot of videos and controversy surfaced that was kind of inevitably brewing underneath the surface. Just a short trip to Harajuku (especially as a foreigner) will show you how expectations and reality couldn't be further apart.
As I already mentioned in my video about the magazine issue, I doubt Lolita fashion will fade away after the print releases stop, however I am really looking forward to some positive, more creative changes that are up on the horizon once the idolization of magazine trends has worn off will hopefully show itself in the western communities as well.
However, 2020 and the whole westernization of Harajuku has invited not only change to iconic places like Harajuku Station - which, if you haven't heard about it yet - is getting a makeover to adjust to the masses of tourists using it. It's kind of sad how the entire 2020 Olympic "clean up process" affected subculture and its base points so far.
One pooint that especially bothers me is tourists taking sneaky pictures. I already talked about the whole issue of people asking you for pictures which is a whole different topic altogether. Whether or not you're annoyed by high schoolers and locals asking for pictures is one thing that highly differs from person to person and depends on what the reason you dress up for is. While I can handle a few people asking me for pictures, I tend to avoid peak times around Takeshita (evenings and weekends) completely. It used to be a great time for getting into popular street snap columns, has lately degraded to something completely else.
One example are tourists sneakily taking pictures of people dressed in J-Fashion without asking for permission, and it can go as far as to finding yourself on someones Snapchat story, face full of the crepe you were looking forward to. It's one of the reasons I started feeling uncomfortable getting into full Lolita attire and going out for a day in Harajuku lately.

In Comparison

While Ouji takes up way less space in my wardrobe, there are a few points that I aesthetically find more appealing in the Lolita silhouette, starting at the waist line with the petticoat. In the photos I'm wearing the same shoes and a similiar type of berret, my favourite color sheme is still black/white/gold, and also my love for crosses and the overall Gothic vibe hasn't changed at all. A lot of shoes are re-useable though during the colder months I actually preferred half-boots.

Closet Sales

After sorting through my closet - as I do every spring - I decided to sell about a third of my dresses and coordinates that I was planning on or already wore but have no further use for. A lot of my lavender colored coords, accessoires, short otome dresses and shoes have already left me and I'm glad to have more space. A lot of my dresses were cramped together in a small closet, and I kept getting more and more both through buying on and sponsorship / review requests.
I doubt I will be able to let go of my entire wardrobe, hence I got really attached to some of the pieces - especially my chocolate collection and my long Baby dresses. Though I don't wear them as much anymore, even less on camera, I still love them and want to keep the opportunity open to wear them again in the future... Whenever that might be.
After all I enjoyed the dive into Ouji fashion I took, and I hope I can find some time to share more boys style outfits with you, even though I doubt I will be going out dressed up to the fullest in Harajuku that much anymore.. Maybe one day.

Until then, Enjoy!

Himezawa

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