Have a Friend/SO Make a Coord For You

When this prompt was first selected, I was excited! In general the idea of having someone else put a coord with your own items is fun because everyone has such different styles of coordinating and sees things differently. There is a lot to be learnt from this experience. However, I hit a roadblock almost immediately.

When I asked my partner if he would have a go (and even encouraged him by saying that I’d wear whatever he picked for date night as soon as it is safe to have one), he responded with a no. He felt like he wouldn’t do a good enough job and opted out. Which was sad on two levels: firstly because he does have a decent sense of style and colour himself and secondly – because I thought it’d be exciting to see how someone with passing second-hand knowledge of the fashion sees things. We may berate newbies when they get things wrong, but there is value in seeing a completely different point of view sometimes. He later tried to backpedal from that and said that he’d do it, but by that point I had already asked people on Instagram for help. And he actually hasn’t put anything together to date, so I wouldn’t have anything if I didn’t ask Instagram.

As is, however, I received quite a few positive responses! It would be massively unfair to have to select only one, seeing as I opened up the opportunity to multiple people, so here is everything that I was sent. These are in order of submission, no favouring anyone in particular.

Coord 1

| BtSSB Polonaise Brillante JSK and OTKs | Primark blouse | Hush Puppies boots | vintage hat | offbrand flower clips | My Inspiration necklace | basket - imaginary |

This first suggestion from @lena_golightly arrived so quickly, it was like a lightning flash! To tell you the truth, my initial gut feeling was that this wouldn’t be enough, but when I saw it together, things clicked into place. My gut feeling was as it was because in my head I always add more to this dress. All my ideas, current and future, are big and bold, whereas this is toned down – and that’s ok too. The absence of a basket is very much felt (and I was contractually obliged to include the piece of paper in its stead), though I’ve no doubts that it would pull this all together into place. And I definitely will try to pair this dress with this hat now that @lena_golightly opened my eyes to the fact that this dress has navy accents duh (they’re just hidden under the apron).

Coord 2

| Angelic Pretty Cinema Doll JSK | Ank Rouge cutsew | Angelic Pretty Drained Cherry OTKs | Bodyline heels | Angelic Pretty Twinkle Sky headbow | offbrand necklace | handmade bracelet | Angelic Pretty mook pochette |

I was super excited when @likeateacup messaged saying they want to join because I totally love their outlook on lolita. We share an appreciation for retro and larme lolita, but I enjoy their, as they call it, “trash” coords a lot too (Tube-chan and Toy Story Aliens are forever associated with them in my brain and no-one else could make these ideas work this well). And the result is nothing short of what I’d expect: a retro lolita coord, but of a sweeter variety on the classic that is Cinema Doll. Having literally just shared some Cinema Doll coords, it’s great that I can share more because while I wanted to add a Cinema Doll with red accents into that lineup, I never did. My own take was still a bit more classic/toeing the line between substyles, whereas @likeateacup committed to the sweet side, which I probably wouldn’t have ever done.

Coord 3

| Angelic Pretty Royal Unicorn Switching JSK | Millefleurs Georgette blouse | Innocent World OTKs | Angelic Pretty Elegant Doll boots | Triple Fortune bonnet | Rose Marie Seoir choker | Angelic Prety Crystal Dream Carnival ring | Promised Land Creations brooch | vintage brooch | Innocent World Playing Cards Chocolate bag |

Here’s a coordinate that has my name written all over it. Whether @rolicherry knew this or not, I have worn this blouse with this dress before, so I know how perfectly they match – it’s just that when I wore them together, I also covered that up with a bolero. And while at first I was a little worried about the bonnet because hello all shades of sax, it’s as if I’ve forgotten my own advice of “screw colour matching – colour block instead” because oh boy, it works so well! I also love how well those socks work with this dress. I recently realised how little I wear them because they don’t match as much as I expected them to, so even if I don’t wear this exact outfit, I totally will pair these socks with this dress again!

Coord 4

| AatP Sugar Plum Fairy Princess JSK | Lady Sloth crop top | Innocent World Shanti OTKs | Innocent World shoes | Axes Femme bolero | Haruhi Clover headbow | Two Days Slow hair clips | vintage necklace | Mademoiselle Boutique Matryoshka necklace | handmade bracelets | DreamV bag |

@lolahbell was the first person to volunteer and another one whose contribution I was very hyped about. Her style, both in and out of lolita, is about reds, blacks and whites, so I sensed that this would be something I wouldn’t have thought of. And I was spot on! Who knew that a sweet take on my primary gothic dress would look so good? Well, @lolahbell did, clearly. The collage she put together included my black wig with instructions to put it into a loose side ponytail with the bow clips somewhere in there, which would’ve balanced out the black at the top nicely. I was also instructed to try adding my black bolero, since the idea was black with pops of red, in case colours needed balancing more. I like both looks pretty equally, to be honest, this is so out of my box that it gets me excited to try it sometime.

Coord 5

| AatP Rosier Fleur JSK | Infanta overblouse | Enchantlic Enchantilly Angel's Ball Party tights | offbrand shoes and kokoshnik | Ebony and Ivory hair clip | Puvithel Crystal Heart necklace and brooch | handmade brooch | vintage brooch |

This coordinate had some liberties taken. My friend @_jealouslovers has given me alternatives for almost every item other than the dress and headdress in case something really didn’t go together. To stick as truly to the original as possible I went with the first pick everywhere I could – which was everything except the shoes (I had sold the first choice) and necklace (because she simply said “a necklace”). Well, and the tights because her choice was “any of the EE tights”, so I went with those because it feels like a while since they featured in anything. And I must say, this is a total banger. Even though she said she resisted scrolling through my Instagram to avoid getting influenced by what I do, this feels exactly like something that I would do. Hello, all white/ivory with pops of colour? When is that not good in my books? The answer: never.

Coord 6

| Haenuli Lovely Memories JSK | Metamorphose blouse | Sosic Shop heels | Innocent World gloves | vintage hat | offbrand necklace and tights |

Last, but certainly not least, is this coordinate put together by @mollypictures. What surprised me about this one was the choice of blouse, which is notably sweeter than everything else. And once again, as soon as I put the pieces together, I saw what eluded me previously. It doesn’t matter that the blouse is much sweeter, because everything else is classic and elegant enough to make up for that. As such this is a great coord for warmer spring or not-too-scorching summer days. It’s a shame that I don’t have a way of photographing these tights in a more flattering way, to show off their crochet lace pattern, but at least they don’t look too atrocious in the flatlay. God, I love this dress, it’s been confined to winter coordinates and I can’t wait to do something more summery with it. Maybe this will be the outfit to do it with? Time will tell.

Conclusion

About halfway through receiving suggestions from people, I began wondering: do my friends really know me that well or is my wardrobe simply that cohesive that they were bound to end up with something that felt very me? Looking at these suggestions, it’s probably a bit of both. As I do wear multiple styles and love trying out new things, it would be very hard for anyone to put together something that I wouldn’t even consider giving a go. And since my wardrobe is quite cohesive, they’d have to try even harder to entirely avoid using some sort of shade of white, red or blue. (It’s not impossible, it merely limits the options to like 3 main pieces.)

If anyone’s interested, you are always welcome to use my wardrobe spreadsheet to play with making coordinates. They don’t have to be for me either – you can make collages of outfits you’d like to wear yourself if you had my wardrobe at your disposal. As I said, it’s fun to see what others could do with your clothes and seeing how they’d use your pieces to create something in their style can open your eyes to new possibilities too. Just tag me or send me your creations somehow, I’d really love to see them. I may even put them into real flatlays if I find the time/energy.

Have you ever had a friend or a significant other put a coordinate for you? What was the result? This post is part of the Lolita Blog Carnival prompt for this week, which means that other bloggers have also joined in, so make sure to check out their posts!

The Bloody Tea Party
Gota de Baunilha
Rose Sanctuary