New Alice and the Pirates Houndstooth Pattern School Series
How is no one talking about the King of Lolita dress from IW?
Lately, I feel like every time I turn around, people are talking about new substyles of lolita. From multi-street-fashion mash-ups, to the long-defined gothic, classic and sweet, to declaring a style based on the theme of a print. So, it’s been making me wonder what other people consider toâ¦A potentially interesting discussion over on EGL that I think more people should participate in! What do you think defines a Lolita substyle? When does something go from just something a few people wear to substyle? Do you differentiate between themes and substyles or just nix substyles all together?
I actually made a venn diagram on my thoughts about substyles and influences xD ( Please see note on this in the actual post for taking it totally out of context!):
This is a nice discussion! The diagram got me intrigued — personally I’d make it so that the “Victorianesque fashions” also overlap with Gothic, plus Aristocrat actually inside Gothic. Though this is a personal view, but I don’t really see it Aristocrat as a separate style, not more than, say, tea length skirts in Classic — what’s interesting however is that publications tend to align Gothic Lolita and Aristocrat a lot more with “goth” than with “lolita”, or so I’ve observed. Maybe a circle of “J-Goth” where the intersection with Lolita is the “Gothic Lolita”? And outside the intersection we can put stuff like Madam~ (I feel like Visual-kei would also intersect between J-Goth and J-Punk, with a sliiiiver going into Lolita)
I do agree that a lot of what people tend to consider as substyles (such as sailor and pirate and guro such) are definitely closer to themes, especially since people tend to treat them a lot more like costumes than the “pure” Big Three. There’s also the factor that any of those themes can lean towards any of the Big Three in aesthetic.
I also do consider Boystyle/Ouji as part of the wider Lolita-kei, so to say, but IMO it works a lot like Ero in that the changes are structural rather than aesthetic or thematic. Whereas Ero is the racier Lolita, Boystyle is the “genderbent” Lolita.
That is just the way I see it, though!
Actually! Aristo might fit really nicely INSIDE of gothic completely, I was trying to make it be a part of general Jgoth as an outside thing and that’s where I was sort of stumped. But I think personally, I see Aristo as a completely separate thing within Jgoth. I’ve always really considered Aristo as a separate Mana related thing. Like whenever I come across someone who refers to themselves as “Aristocrat” about 99% of the time it’s someone who owns an almost exclusively Moitie wardrobe (sprinkled with a few very similar stye other brand pieces) and I would honestly probably consider “Mana fan” as a separate bubble that intersects with Lolita and a VK bubble because it honestly seems like the “Mana Fandom” exists outside of the Lolita group, even though the clothes are the same. It just seems like a lot of Moitie collectors/Mana fans have their own separate subculture from the rest of Lolita. Then again, this is just something I personally feel and I know that not everyone else thinks that way! If I were to redo the diagram, there would probably be a Visual Kei, Mana Fandom, JGoth (in that overlapping order) group of bubbles that intersect with the Gothic bubble.
I think boystyle would intersect probably in that case? I was always under the impression that boystyle was just a thing people enjoyed doing, and some of them enjoyed doing it with frilly clothes. Like the style is too all over the place for me to really pinpoint down within the Lolita spectrum entirely. Obviously the puffy AatP pants, Boz vests, Moitie blouses coordinates could fit nicely, but a lot of the more casual vest/slightly frilly shirt/capri pants coordinates are really far removed from me.
Of course, before someone messages me with “OMG I HATE YOU BECAUSE YOU SAID IF YOU WEAR MOITIE YOURE NOT A LOLITA DIIIEEE” messages, this is just musings on how different fashions have intersected with Lolita and obviously not even remotely concrete.I do see your point! Especially on the Mana Fandom part, haha. It’s a very particular type of “brand loyalism” — I wonder if it was like that (obviously in smaller scale) with Dada’s Arachnophobia as well? I do tend to prefer Atelier BOZ’ aristocrat rather than Moitié’s (even if it was Moitié that got me into the style), but I am aware I’m not in the majority. :P
And I agree about boystyle, I wasn’t considering the less frilly portion of it.
I just remembered something that is missing and would possibly facilitate (or make it a hundred times more difficult, lol) on working on the intersections: Natural-kei (of which Mori and Dolly would be sub-bubbles I guess?). I feel like defining the “parent” styles would help in defining the Lolita substyles; they all have a base in Natural-kei, but Gothic got a lot more of musical (and subcultural Goth too I guess) influence.
(Also: the “hot mess” intersection between the Big Three? Totally Meta. Shine on, Metamorphose, I love how crazy you are xoxo)
I was actually wondering where Natural Kei would go myself (although I don’t believe Dolly is really an evolution of that style? but Mori seems to be?). While natural kei sort of started the whole thing going, I would probably put a bubble intersecting with the blank “Lolita” circle and have the “Pure Lolita” be at the merging point honestly, as that’s the Lolita style that really hasn’t changed as much over the years and still honestly looks like shorter puffier Natural Kei dresses.
Oh my gosh you’re totally right about Meta xD Meta IS the center there, with their ridiculous poofy pastel floral dresses with like crosses and candles all over them!
I know this is sort of totally over-analytical about the Lolita substyles, but it’s honestly really fun to think about these things xD
(Source: dieselsteamgypsy, via a-lady-dandy)
Innocent World - Mary Bell Onepiece
(Bust: 105 - 138cm / Waist: 67 - 107 cm)
(via trespassurged)
Darling Army pinafore got here today!!!! I’M SO EXCITED. I don’t check my paypal email often so I had no idea it was even done, let alone shipped! XD
Click the pictures for comments/review. I need to get some cute platform sneakers or something to match *O*
(via fyeahoffbrand)
Innocent World’s 15th anniversary newest print: Anniversary Happy Pie
Photo from sugar-milky-bunnyAll I can think of is boob pie. XD omnomnomnomnom
First of all, I apologize for the bad photoshop job lol. I wanted it to look pretty. If you can’t see it that well, here’s a full-sized one.
I like to think of lolita and ouji as twins and aristocrat as the elder sibling. Sometimes they can cross over, especially aristocrat and ouji.
Aristocrat: most mature, minimal skin, very straight cuts
Lolita: about knee-length dresses and skirts with poof from a petticoat
Ouji: Boyish, often with fantasy type influences (example: pirates), usually consisting of vest, blouse, and shorts
I typed up a more detailed version on my blog if you’d like to read more.
(via turnerstokens)
Violets inside Mansions Skirt from Innocent World
Price: 16,590 yen
Materials
Outer fabric: 100% Cotton/violet print Jacquard
Inner lining: 100% polyesterColors: Pink, Blue, Black
Measurements:
Waist 60cm～74cm
Skirt length 55cm
Belt width 4cm
I literally gasped when I saw this on the website. I wish the OP (24990 yen) wasn’t the long version (85cm!) because I like the bodice more than the high waist (23940) or 3 ribbon (19950) version. ( I super wish I could get the high waist version right now too though)
Embroidered Violin Skirt from Innocent World
Price: 18,690 yen
Material:
Outer fabric: 100% Cotton/Katsuragi
Inner lining: 100% polyesterColors:
Beige×Chocolat
Mint×Chocolat
Chocolat×Beige
Black×BeigeSize:
Waist 58cm～73cm
Skirt length 55cm
(Source: innocent-w.jp)
SO THIS IS MY BOOK THAT I’VE BEEN WORKING ON. It’s 24 pages in full color jammed full with my designs for The Hobbit * O * Each dwarf got their own page with outfit break downs(down to their fucking crazy patterns UGH OMG). Also included are 4 new pages of new materials of non-dwarven characters that I’ve drawn designs for. I hope you guys will like it as much as I’ve enjoyed working on it hehe.
