AYWi30C #26 - Item You Bought First That You Still Have

If you’ve watched the video in which I talked through my process for this coordinate, this post may feel a bit like I’m repeating myself. I will try to do as little of that as possible but there is only so much more new stuff to mention. Though I must say that I am really excited with this coord, so much so that when I wore it to film it, it ended up being on for the whole day because it simply felt very me.

| Bodyline L262 JSK (altered) | offbrand jacket | Snag White Russian fishnet tights | Angelic Pretty Wrapping Cherry socks |  offbrand shoes | Angelic Pretty Twinkle Sky headbow | offbrand sunglasses, earrings and necklace | Cutie Craze Cafe Whip Cream Cherry ring |

Laid out flat it conveys most of the rockabilly-meets-lolita look that I was going for, though not all of it. Hair and makeup definitely pull it together into a singular creation, though this is enough to see the vision and see its cohesiveness.

For all the appreciation I have for black, it just dawned on me that I do prefer white for my 'edgy' things, whether that be biker jackets, goth looks or leather accessories.

I almost didn’t buy this jacket when I had the chance. I’m glad that I did because it is one that I wear regularly and this coord in particular proved how well it goes with lolita. Finding a non-black leather or pleather jacket that’s waist length is challenging, especially if you don’t hit them being in vogue at the time. This was round about the time that Japanese lolita brands have just ended their biker jacket resurgence phase and I always doubted the fit of those on me, so to find one offbrand was perfect.

I might try to improve on this impromptu idea for future flatlays requiring fishnets and other awkward legwear.

In the absence of blouse, let’s move down to legwear. Could I please have a moment of appreciation for my ingenuity here? Because the ankle socks, whilst cute, were not all there was to this look, but fishnets are a flatlay nightmare. This right here is a DVD wrapped in tissue paper, which whilst not perfect at least allowed me to include those fishnets in the flatlay. And together with the ankle socks they looked absolutely killer!

Biggest claim to fame for this model of heels? Rock M Sakura wore these in pink in her entrance look on RPDR. Oh yes, I spotted that familiar design instantly!

In the video I mentioned earlier I talked how these shoes are not lolita. And they aren’t, despite whatever the long list of tags on eBay may have tried to say. Having said that, this isn’t my first time wearing them with lolita and it certainly won’t be my last. The key is always in finding the right coord for these shoes, work their style into the overall look of the outfit instead of just coordinating based on colour and hoping for the best. As such they have featured in larme-style lolita outfits, other retro ones, and I’m sure that if I put my mind to it, I’d come up with a few more options. But they do spend most of their worn time with just regular vintage-style looks.

Even if you hadn't seen the coord, this photo alone would tell you that it's a retro one.

My idea of retro, whether lolita or not, is to go big with accessories. Few bold pieces will have a much stronger impact than lots of smaller ones, especially if they’re novelty or even a bit quirky. So whilst I definitely could’ve added more, I feel like anything more would have detracted from the look. If anyone out there is reading this post in search of tips on how to retro lolita, let this be one of them: stick to a handful of big, bold accessories.

A trusty staple thanks to its lovely shape and just-right size, neither too big nor too small.

In the end, despite considering several options, I went with the same headbow as I wore for the first AYWi30C post. Whilst I could’ve opted for something else, lack of alternatives was certainly not the reason, refer back to what I said in the last paragraph: big and bold over lots of small things. This headbow stands up on its own very well and is together with the bright colour it’s distinctive enough to not need a support act.

Rule no 47 of character development: If they can clearly see your eyes, then you're the nice character.

It might seem odd to include sunglasses as an accessory, I can’t say that I don’t get it. And usually they wouldn’t be so much an accessory as a weather-dictated necessity. But in this particular case not only the weather played no part in it (I was indoors on a rainy day), the sunglasses were a key element to my core concept of a “good girl going bad and trying to blend in with the cool kids, but not quite shaking off her good girl-ness and cuteness”. Every tough cool kid wears sunglasses, especially when they’re dressed in anything retro, that’s just the rules! What else can give a person such a mysterious look about them? I also once heard someone comment that for a femme putting sunglasses on is putting their bitch face on, which is such a vibe. Leather jacket and sunglasses are this coord’s bad girl accessories and without them she is no longer a bad girl.

Definitely one of my favourite rings, even if that's not reflected through wear.

As far as I remember, the earrings I may have actually made, whereas the necklace was bought? But I genuinely can't be sure at this point.

Talking about jewellery collectively because, as we can all see, everything here is cherry. The necklace has lost its leaf gems, which I could replace, I have a spare charm somewhere, but I just can’t be bothered deconstructing the whole thing just for that. If anything, the no green gems look adds a touch of toughness to the look to balance out the cutesy whipped cream swirls of the ring. And let me tell you, I do absolutely adore this ring! I’m just not used to wearing rings in general, let alone large ones like this, so it tends to spend most of its time unworn.

What a satisfying bow! Bodyline can do things right when they try.

As the JSK is not a print and half of it is covered by the jacket, there are fewer detail shots than usual. The relative simplicity of it is what makes it so versatile, able to take on different themes and types of styling. Which I suspect I may not have done it justice over the years, not through how I’ve worn it. But that’s ok - I’ve owned it for 10 whole years and I plan on owning it for a good few more, so there’s plenty of time to show it some love still!

The downside of this type of lace is that it can curl up if you don't take the time to straighten it when it's still wet after a wash.

Whenever we talk about how Bodyline’s quality “is not so bad”, this is the sort of thing that we mean. The lace may not be incredible, but this particular one is some sort of cotton or polycotton, which doesn’t immediately evoke images of 1960s net curtains at our grandmothers’ places. Moreover, it is used sparingly, to really accent the lines on the dress rather than overwhelm it. Neither the lace nor the dress fabric, an unlined polycotton with a bit of stretch, are high enough quality that we’d expect from major brands, but which we accept from a more mass-production company like Bodyline at the price tag that it had. It’s obviously nicer than what you’d get in a costume shop and this particular JSK surpasses most fast fashion clothes that I’ve owned over the years (despite not being immune to signs of wear), which helps it work for lolita fashion and hold its own against much higher quality items produced by the major Japanese or the major indie brands.

Bold and beautiful, because sticking to a few elements and doing them well is better than an overload of half-arsed extras.

In a sense, this design fits with the whole ‘big and bold’ idea that retro fashions and rockabilly enjoy so much, since besides the polka dots, the big bows, some lace and a ruffled hem there isn’t much else to it. But gaudy details and overwhelming prints, whilst certainly great in their own right, are not everything there is to lolita fashion. Once more I marvel at the sheer dumb luck that I had when buying this dress because I think that had I started out with prints only, I would’ve had a slightly harder time trying to get my wardrobe to a point of being cohesive and having versatile options to wear along the way. Having a simpler dress to fall back on whilst I was still building my collection certainly saved me a few times during that process. Even though coordinating solids comes with its own set of challenges and things to learn.

False eyelashes are from Lola's Lashes and they may have become my new favourite pair after this one wear.

Whilst I took some selfies without the sunglasses, you are seeing everything there was to this makeup here anyway. I did not bother with anything besides eyeliner, lashes, lipstick and some blush (and a base for the camera) because the look didn’t need it. Why overcomplicate things that work as they are? Sunglasses on or off, there was some form of cat eye there and with the red lip that was enough to convey the idea. Hair-wise, whilst I originally planned on doing a single victory roll, in the end I kept it simple with a curled ponytail and fringe. Bad girls have too much mischief to do to spend ages doing their hair, all you really need it to be is to not get in your face while you get into trouble.

I recovered as much as I could, but there are definitely looks that are lost to history.
From left to right these are from: May 2011, August 2012, July 2016, November 2017, July 2018, December 2018, October 2019, March 2020, August 2020, November 2020, and January 2021.

For all the versatility this dress has, I once again failed to showcase that properly. But as I said, it’s fine, I have years to come with this dress to make up for it. Sadly, two looks only remain in the form of a selfie, which is sad, but I still wanted to include those, if only for my own record. Now that I have a snapshot of how I have worn this, I can focus on putting new looks with this dress in the future, explore other options, particularly when it comes to colours.

If you think that I had fun putting this look together and wearing it, just imagine the fun that I had filming and editing the lookbook! It was such a blast and it came out just the way I envisioned it. Although it turns out that I suck at blowing bubble gum balloons - but that packet of candy floss that turns into bubble gum was absolutely worth its price of £0.29! I forgot how much fun chewing gum was.