Summer ILD

Belated happy International Lolita Day to you all! I hope that however you celebrated, it was frilly and you had a lovely time. I joined the extended Yorkshire comm who came together to celebrate with a tea party in York.

| BtSSB Full of Stars "Bright Starry Night" JSK I |
Infanta blouse | AP Rose Garden Princess headbow |
Antaina heels | Enchantlic Enchantilly Invitation
to Angel's Ball tights | Peacockalorum underskirt |
offbrand jewellery |

This look has been on the back burner for almost a year now, in which time it changed slightly and became more refined. Not to be too vain, but I am incredibly pleased with how it came out, there’s not a thing that I would change (maybe except adding gel insoles to the shoes for more comfort), everything was exactly in the right place. It’s not often that a coord comes out this way, perfectionists will always find something to tweak, however minute, so to this is a Lolita milestone.

Although the meet was organised by people who are primarily Leeds Lolitas, as usual, the events are open to everyone in the Yorkshire comms, and beyond. It was incredible to catch up with friends whom I wish I saw more often, get to know better people I’ve only had the chance to speak to once or twice and to make some new friends. With people coming from all kinds of areas – Leeds, Sheffield, York, Hull, Manchester and even Derby – it truly felt like a community coming together. This is the benefit of being part of a larger comm.

The tea was hosted at Gray’s Court hotel in York, which is located just behind York Minster, but is tricky to find if you don’t know where you’re going. While the tea itself was of quite standard quality, lovely and tasty, and it would’ve been better if they left the teapots at the table rather than serve (because there wasn’t a waiter constantly in the room, we ran out of tea very quickly), but the quality of the service was fantastic. At one point we realised that we were short on food, but when we asked the hotel swiftly brought more without charging us extra. We were provided a separate room just to ourselves and one of the staff members was half-enamoured half-awestruck by our 20-strong group of fancily dressed Lolitas – he said that in the 20-odd years of him working there he’s never seen anything like us, in terms of dress and our manners/attitude, and urged us to come back, which was very sweet of him.

The cakes section

And please, a round of applause to our fantastic hosts who did a great job. At the beginning they provided all of us with an activity booklet – brilliant idea, both in terms of breaking the ice (you could talk whilst doing bingo or ask someone for help with find the differences task, difficulty level: Mana-sama) and keeping us occupied during the quieter times (design your own print or do Misako’s makeup). The booklet is also where they stuck everyone’s raffle ticket, so no need to worry over losing it. They also ensured that there were enough raffle prizes so that everyone won something. I was lucky in that I won a brooch from Peacockalorum’s new series of accessories, which I nearly purchased earlier on. The prizes ranged from as little as a set of stickers to as big as a brand dress (it was a floral print by Meta, but I don’t know the name of it – but looked like something very much in style of the Lolita who won it).

Our activity booklet

Raffle prizes

Jewel Feather brooch by Peacockalorum

The rest of the day passed by on socialising, chatting, taking photos and admiring the hotel’s beautiful garden in the sunny, summery weather. We definitely extensively covered the topic of the upcoming Dreamy Masquerade Carnival event in London: how excited we are, what people are going to wear, tips on crafting items (I got some too), even planning some of our meals out already, when will we hear more updates (since two of the attendees are involved with organising the event) and more. It’s casual chatter like this that I miss most when I’m not at events, since meets are the only times when I can talk to people in person about Lolita.

I admit, it was a shame to be going home when I did. I would’ve loved to join people for the casual afterparty that some of them spontaneously created, but I was quite tired and I didn’t want to get home too late since I had a good hour of travelling to do to get home. Now that we’re so close to summer solstice, the days really are longer so 5pm felt closer to midday than evening. Still, when you’re pulling out all the stops for an outfit, taking those stops off (in my case, especially the shoes and false eyelashes) feels amazing. At the same time, I’m now on a summer high and a meet high, so I’m not taking well to being deprived of either (next meet will be in July, unless I manage to make it to another comm’s one, and the weather has cooled down a bit now), I’m having withdrawal symptoms and want the summer holidays to start already.

How was your ILD this year? Did you do anything? More importantly, did you enjoy your day? And please, someone tell me that I’m not alone in planning the winter ILD outfit already, to keep the high going!