There is a saying in Polish, which literally translates to “April’s a mixer, mixing a bit of winter and a bit of summer”. The unpredictability of the weather has certainly been reflected in what I wore this month, both in and out of lolita, hardly ever getting the layers just right. But at least they were cute layers.
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Coord 1: No Joke
| Metamorphose Classical Sister OP | Innocent World Origa OTKs | offbrand shoes | Antique Beast headdress | Grimoire brooch | Voodoodolly ring | Dalao Home wig |
I still find it funny how often people tell me that they didn't recognise me at first when I wear blonde wigs.
Teeny tiny brooch from an event I never went to, but which is too cute nonetheless.
The reason I call this no joke is because I happened to wear this on April Fool’s Day, though not with any intention of fooling anyone into thinking that I’ve either turned blonde or goth. This also was my no-joke coord for this month’s No Buy Support Challenge, so read more about it there.
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Coord 2: Sunday Princess
| Angelic Pretty Flower Garden JSK | Lady Sloth Snowflake Lace blouse | Baroque Repose of Queen tights and headbow | Irregular Choice Earl Grey shoes | Gravelvet Iridescent Princess necklace | offbrand ribbon as a choker | Madillustration brooch |
This bow is so big and sticky-outy, no wonder I don't wear it often.
A moment of appreciation for how the smaller gems on that necklace match the ribbons on this JSK.
This coord has been on my mind for so long and even though the temperature wasn’t quite warm enough, since it was a Sunday I spent at home I decided to ignore that. Sunday best doesn’t have to be taken out to church, my living room is equally worthy of my Sunday best. Because it’s nice to be aesthetic whilst sipping tea, writing, sorting out your odds and ends at the end of a week, and just generally existing in a fancy way.
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Coord 3: Dorky Ouji
| Metamorphose Wizarding Lesson shorts | Chess Story Gift from Budapest blouse | Jane Marple OTKs | offbrand shoes | handmade bow pin (not by me) |
It was prime time for some casual ouji and whilst looking at what options I had available to me that I haven’t yet tried with these shorts, I landed on the navy x lavender combo (even though the socks are a true grey, but it doesn’t matter). Once I put that bow pin on, I thought that the whole look has a bit of a dorky vibe, like I’m about to explain chemistry to you, which I can’t, but the vibe isn’t bad.
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Coord 4: Warrington Meetup
| Angelic Pretty Diner Doll JSK, headbow and OTKs | Laura Ashley blouse | offbrand shoes | Sweet Dolly House necklace | Lady Sloth brooch |
It's a shame that my hairstyle hasn't shown up properly because I've figured out how to make a very cute bun.
A jar of macarons for a time of need.
On Sunday I attended a really chill meetup in Warrington, which I’ve never been to. Anticipating a fair bit of walking and needing to be practical, my idea started with the bum bow backpack and the wanting to have pockets, which eventually led to all of this. I really like how this whole coord came out, it was very on brand for me and did exactly what it needed which was to keep me comfortable, as well as cute. Warrington turned out to have a couple of hidden gems, as well as a whole host of lovely people across the various businesses we frequented, and I would more than happily go back there for more meetups, which hopefully will happen.
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Coord 5: Working Hard
| After Midnight The First Semester JSK | Axes Femme cutsew | Innocent World Rose Lace Millefeuille bolero | Innocent World Rose and Diamond OTKs | Sosic Shop shoes | offbrand barrette | Angelic Pretty Melty Ribbon Chocolate ring |
Two thirds of the times that I dress up for working from home there is no will for any makeup.
Very pleased that you can see some of the pattern on the socks as well as the ring.
I can’t remember what this coord idea was originally for, probably some chill Sunday, but that didn’t happen and it felt just as appropriate for a WFH Tuesday. I love the librarian vibes of this coord and the more classic lolita/otome/vintage fashion’s approach to colour balancing (i.e. not so prescriptive). I was going to put a bit of makeup for the photos, but then decided that it was pointless, bare face is how I work most days, it’s not always necessary to pretend that this isn’t the case.
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Coord 6: Brightly Coloured
| Bodyline L249 JSK | Metamorphose blouse | Pinky Girls cardigan | Metamorphose Heart Ladder Lace OTKs | Sosic Shop shoes | Red Maria headbow | Sweet Dolly House necklace | Risu Rose ring | offbrand ring and clips on the cardigan |
Apparently April was the month of big centre bows.
Ngl, I am so pleased with the last minute idea that adding these clips to the cardigan was.
Admittedly, I have been putting off wearing this cardigan with this JSK until my yellow socks arrived. But the weather got more spring-like again after a brief return to cooler things and this idea was too cute to keep putting off any longer. I also needed a coord to film another Advanced Coordinating video in, so it fell on this one. Although as I had to leave for a blood donation appointment that same day, I changed the blouse, socks and cardigan for something lighter. Achievement unlocked: donating blood in lolita!
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Coord 7: Easter Prep
| Innocent World Georges Rose JSK | offbrand blouse and shoes | Tutuanna socks | Cutie Creator headbow | After Midnight necklace | Hello Crumpet Kukuryku brooch | handmade bracelets |
I love working with second day post-curling hair, even super simple buns suddenly gain a lot more volume.
Robert's first Easter!
The day after that was the Saturday before Easter and I had so many things to cook/bake. But I didn’t want to forego looking cute entirely and in wanting to get Robert the Rooster out for his mandatory Easter outing, this coord was born. The black accents are very classy and there are enough of them to balance each other out against the rest being ivory. I felt very much like a lifestyler cooking and baking in this.
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Coord 8: Easter Monday
| Lady Sloth Winter Spices skirt | Axes Femme cutsew | Tutuanna socks | Irregular Choice Flickety Kiss shoes | offbrand beret | handmade headbow and bracelets | Once Upon a Cookie Treat Jelly Cookie necklace | Twinkle Kitty Boutique rings |
Tfw when you wear a beret indoors because it's the look for the day.
Fitting perfectly into that collar.
In a slight break from my Easter traditions so far, I have not worn frills on Easter Sunday itself, though I still dressed up. However, it would’ve been a shame to waste the final day off on pyjamas, so I searched for something cute and comfortable. Despite plans to divide my wardrobe up into seasonal items, I haven’t done that yet and to capitalise on that, I decided to whip out the Winter Spices skirt before it gets packed up until winter. Christmas, Easter, who cares what holiday this skirt gets worn for, it’s exactly the level of cuteness and comfort that I wanted for a day mostly spent on chores and editing.
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Coord 9: Botany Student
| BtSSB's Dreaming Sherbet skirt | Axes Femme blouse | Fi.n.t. cardigan | AatP Lace-Up Ribbon OTKs | Bodyline shoes | Cutie Creator headbow | Tiny Passerine Creations necklace | Le Petit Four ring | Violet Fane brooch |
Look at all the floral details there, they make me so happy.
As is often the case, the unexpected freebie that I never would've bought myself turns out to be such a great staple piece within my wardrobe.
Except the earrings, this is exactly the same coord as in the 54th 1 Dress 4 Look post. The weather somehow managed to be warm and cool at the same time, making this combinations of thin layers just the right thing for a day spent working from home. And whilst this usually doesn’t happen, somehow the outfit helped me focus on the task of tidying up and organising some information easier. You can’t look studious and then not act studious, you know?
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Coord 10: Friendly Visit
| Haenuli Lovely Memories JSK | offbrand blouse | Innocent World Rose Lace Millefeuille bolero | Baroque Secret Garden tights | Sosic Shop shoes | Angelic Pretty Classical Petit Rose headbow | Tiny Passerine Creations The Duchess’ Tea parure |
Testing a different way of curling my hair on a freshly(ish) chopped hair.
The pattern on these sleeves is so lovely, it doesn't get enough appreciation.
A friend came over for an afternoon of frills and chatting - which turned into a whole 7 hours of that. Since I had just chopped my hair and I needed an opportunity to practice this particular hair roller set, I went with an elegant coordinate (though less vintage-inspired than what I had planned originally). This JSK remains one of my favourites and always makes me feel so elegant.
And another curling method tested (this one somehow lasted three days, might be my record!).
An all-ivory coord just makes every other colour pop.
My original ideas for what to wear that day were different, including ideas involving this dress. However, what they had in common was they were all much too fancy for a Monday spent working from home. Then I remembered this scarf that I bought in Poland and everything else just clicked into place. I also like the scarf tied around my waist in lieu of a belt, and with this whole coord being ivory it kind of made me want to get a chemise a’la reine dress. It may or may not still happen, we shall see.
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Whilst part of me thought that I would’ve been able to squeeze one or two outfits more, on the other hand this does feels like more than I have so far this year. Whether it’s the influence of more spring-like weather, waking up from the winter and an end-of-year slumber, or the optimism of having finally figured out some direction for my style, things feel on the upside now. Though in typical me fashion, the moment the weather warms up, my brain wants to layer up. Please, brain, let us be seasonal for once!
My plans for May involve more of the same, really. I am dreading June and the start of a very busy period at work, so I would like to squeeze as much out of May as possible.
So let’s say that you’ve read every Advanced Coordinating post so far or watched every video. They made sense to you, they’ve helped you realise that you really are much further along than you thought, that you’re really not a beginner anymore. That in itself is amazing and you should celebrate that! But now it seems that your shopping list has at least doubled in length with all these things you feel you should get. First of all, if that is the case, then I apologise. Whilst it was never my intention to make anyone feel like they need to have a large collection, I realise that my emphasising how some aspects of advanced coordinating rely on owning the right pieces to achieve the look has had that effect.
Truth is that not everyone can have a large collection and not everyone may want to either. Both approaches are equally valid and lolita fashion isn’t intrinsically about maximalism. Being able to do the most that’s possible with the least amount necessary is a skill that goes a long way and helps keep the size of one’s collection manageable (good for storage, good for the budget, good for creativity - good all around). And even those who do own a lot may sometimes have need for a capsule, for example when travelling or to get out of the rut of only using their full sets as full sets.
This is exactly what this instalment sets out to do: share with you some of the tips and tricks that will maximise your options without constantly getting new things. It will tie together a lot of the topics that I have covered previously, and I will link them as they are mentioned, so that you can refresh your knowledge or catch up before carrying on. Unlike the previous instalments of Advanced Coordinating, the things I mention here are much more independent from each other, meaning that it is easier to pick one or two that apply to your situation best and ignore the others, as opposed to a gradation of difficulty or different facets of the same thing. So fingers crossed wherever you are in your lolita fashion journey and however you approach this fashion, you will find something useful for yourself here.
To get the obvious out of the way and to repeat what I said in the very first Advanced Coordinating post, hair and makeup are your biggest friend here. There is so much that you can change about a look just by applying a different coloured lipstick or doing your hair differently without ever needing to buy any new item of clothing. Do refer to the example in the post linked above using the same OP and hat, but also compare how different the pictures below feel. Even if you cover up the different skirts, whilst these are obviously the same top halves when it comes to clothing, the styling of the hair makes a significant difference. Sure, the accessories do a lot of lifting here too, but do you definitely need to get new ones to make the looks feel different? All that’s really changed between these two is no beret vs beret, the earrings, and a brooch vs no brooch. Minimalist as heck, which was necessary for the practical purposes of travelling, but it goes to show how stuck we can get on the idea of needing everything to be entirely made up of different items to make the coords different. If these two looks hadn’t been seen side by side, most people wouldn’t have even noticed that they rely on practically the same outfit base. Use what’s already within your control to your advantage - as you can see, it doesn’t even have to be any majorly complicated hairstyles or makeup looks, though of course the more skilled you are the more scope you’ll have to play with.
Put your hand over the skirts and even then the looks give off different vibes. All the more so if you do include the skirts in there.
Speaking of travelling as an example, whilst I did say at the beginning that I don’t want anyone feeling like they now have to start buying loads to round out their wardrobes, there is an element of planning that’s unavoidable when trying to maximise your options. Packing and capsule wardrobes demand that by nature, though there are indisputable benefits to planning the direction of your wardrobe as a whole too. I’m certainly in no position to shame the chameleon lolitas who seem to own a little bit of everything, that’d be very hypocritical of me. But I am also not blind to how much more cohesive my collection would be if I set out on and then stuck to a substyle, a colour palette or a theme. So instead I can only talk about planning when in reference to travelling, where having as many interchangeable pieces as possible is crucial. The good thing is that all you need is to pick one thing to base the capsule (or your whole wardrobe) around for things to start falling into places - and that something could be anything! It could be a colour (@hellquinn doesn’t lose any style versatility by sticking to an all-black wardrobe), it could be a substyle (self-explanatory, but have a look at @prettyknightlauri’s ouji looks, for example), it could be an overarching theme or aesthetic (like @sweetlullabai chocolate lolita), it could even be a singular item if we’re talking a capsule rather than a whole wardrobe. Planning around something helps ensure that you have more pieces that fit within that box than not. You don’t have to do that for your whole wardrobe, as Mana is my witness I don’t. But take it from me as one of those who have a little bit of everything - I can attest to how much easier it is when a wardrobe or a capsule has some connecting element in there, since it allows for much more free mixing and matching of the individual elements.
Using my January trip to London as an example, my connecting elements there were the red boots and a vague colour palette of ‘can it be coorded with red, white and/or black’. The top looks are what I planned, what I knew I wanted to wear to the shows that I was seeing. However, the shows weren’t until the evening and not all of these were practical enough to wear for museum or shopping trips during the day. By making sure that every piece could be worn with red, ivory or black, and that all of the accessories I brought were interchangeable, I was able to put together some more casual looks without needing to add anything extra. Between the items that you can see below I haven’t gotten anywhere near to exhausting all of the potential coord possibilities, even if I excluded the first coord from the left as the obvious outlier that introduced brown and green to the mix. All it took was about an hour of throwing things on my bed, checking what I could wear with what, and seeing if it fit with the shoes I planned on wearing. Which, for those of you interested, looked like this.
Do zoom in to notice every detail.
After that you can start having fun imagining what else was possible with the items that you dowith what you can see being packed.
However, travelling and capsule wardrobes aside, making the most out of what we own isn’t restricted to just that, it’s something we can do at any time and any occasion. Those are merely situations that force us into being stricter about that. A great next step for everyone who started out (or maybe even continues) buying full sets out of fear that they won’t have anything to match with the dress is to get into mixing them. Yes, take all those nice sets you’ve accumulated and throw them together, regardless of which series they go with. Maybe not quite so literally, but whilst having a full set is nice for that easy and low effort option, you’re not limited to just that! Think about them in terms of colours: do they work together, can you space them out between one another enough to hide any mismatches, are they at least a similar undertone, could you mix two in a more unexpected way? Think about them in terms of themes - and not just motifs from the releases themselves, if they are printed, but also themes that you could create, the inspirations and ideas, the areas of plausible overlap and aesthetics… Haenuli’s Just One Bite and BtSSB’s Polonaise Brillante may not seem like they have much in common, yet somehow they both pulled off a folksy kind of styling thanks to the themes that I was able to impose on them. Because sets can also be your base outfits and trusted combinations of pieces, not just items from the same release. Switching your thinking from one to the other is already going to open up a whole world of possibilities when it comes to mixing and matching them, so you can start with that if there is a base combo (like a cardigan and legwear or shoes and a bag etc.) that you use a lot.
I know that so many people out there have spent most of their money on dresses, so mix and match your trusted base sets. And don't be afraid to mix and match the detachable pieces - this apron came with Polonaise Brillante, but who's to stop me wearing it with other dresses?
But since I appreciate that I tend to be in the minority in that I rarely buy a full set, let me also show you some examples of mixing the actual release sets between one another. It wasn’t easy to find some because I only have a few full sets to begin with and don’t typically use them as one unit, so finding an effective example took time. In the end I picked Baroque’s Repose of Queen, which is one of the few releases that I have a full set for: the dress, the headpiece and the legwear. Although I’ve only ever worn it as a full set (with some extras) once, for the 15th AYWi30C post about following the rules. The headbow and the tights from this release, whilst printed, are versatile enough to be easily worked into other styles and looks. Printed legwear can be a great addition to spice up a solid coloured main piece, like in the 8th AYWi30C look, or for tying in a colour palette and/or theme with a printed one, like in this dark classic look from April 2021. Similarly, even a printed headbow isn’t restricted to just the release it came with. Though admittedly I haven’t worn mine much in general, the ornate filigree and floral print of Repose of Queen would work as beautifully with the Rococo vibes of BtSSB’s Soiree of the Beginning of My Memories as with any other solid dress that needed some extra pizzaz. And considering how having a pair of items from the same release can work wonders in tying together the various elements within a coord, even using them as a set with a completely different main piece gets more bang for your buck within your wardrobe. Remember, coordinating is not the same as matching. It’s fine to have a full set, but the set items are more than just a bit of the same print and/or fabric as a dress. They’re colours, motifs, themes, and vibes, all of which can be coordinated, complemented, enhanced, evoked, used to your advantage in whatever way you can think of. That is how you maximise the potential of your wardrobe.
The closer the full sets are in colour and/or theme to the rest of your wardrobe, the easier it will be to use them with other main pieces. Often just being within the same substyle can be enough to allow for some interchangeability.
The final point that I’d like to make is about thinking beyond the intended purpose of individual items. So many elements come together into a singular lolita outfit, but how often do we really think past the labels? Just because something is a dress doesn’t mean that you can’t use it as a blouse, an underskirt, a skirt, a cape… Similarly with placement: a hair clip doesn’t have to go in your hair, it can be pinned to your beret, the skirt of the dress, your shoes, across the chest as a brooch, to your bag… And then there are the detachable pieces: put them on dresses they didn’t come with, put them in places they weren’t advertised to be used, as well as add and remove them as required. The sky's the limit, so play with what you have. Doing so can not only switch up the look of a coord that’s the same as something you’ve worn before, but also add a whole lot of depth with careful placement or change up the silhouette of an outfit, or even add a touch of theming. I know that it can feel daunting to do so much mixing around, especially if you feel like your wardrobe is all over the place and you have pastels next to jewel tones. Remember that colours can be contrasting, as well as matching, that some themes work with multiple colour palettes, that if you have pockets of accessories for various sides of your wardrobe, then you can probably make them work together based on that one common thread - and take it from there.
To demonstrate how thinking outside the box opens up a world of possibilities, let me use the Valentine's witch look from February this year as my example. It is full of things being used differently than the purpose they were intended for. This Puvithel necklace pinned to the brim of the hat is just the most prominent one here, even if also the most striking one. Besides that there is heart-shaped confetti glued to my face in lieu of freckles, one brooch pinned to the belt, and another brooch pinned to a pouch, which in itself is a card game. The other ones are more minor in comparison to the necklace on the hat, though they still work to create a cohesive look and make up for the lack of actual items I may have wanted. In my opinion, a bunch of safety pins, some eyelash glue, and a touch of lateral thinking is often all that you need to bend the world to your vision instead of your vision having to bend to the world.
I believe that necessity is the mother of invention. Even if having a very specific theme helps.
The most creative examples of people maximising what they own usually come either out of a place of need or out of the desire to be OTT. This doesn't mean that you can't do the same with simpler coords - from using JSKs as skirts to pinning elements from one dress onto another, combine every aspect of advanced coordinating to work with your style. Whilst a minimalist wardrobe may create the need for more extreme/creative mixing and matching, it also seems to me that those content with a minimalist collection are happy sticking to simpler and by-the-book looks. So in a way, if your own collection has hit the awkward growing pains by being bigger than just a beginner's, but not yet the overwhelming size of someone who's been in the fashion for 10+ years, you may actually be in the prime position to test these tips fully, to have enough to work with and enough gaps to need to think outside the box sometimes. Prompt challenges and themed meetups are a great motivator for those more conceptual looks, while attempting to get by with a capsule or trending tags like OP x JSK could help you try out something more appropriate for daily wear. And also don't feel like you have to employ all of these suggestions all at once. Maximising your options isn't a competition of how original you can get. Each coord and occasion will demand something slightly different, so look at them individually. One may feel like the colour balance is a bit off, which could be fixed with a detachable bow being pinned to a particular place. Another look might need an extra oomph to tie in a particular theme and using a necklace as a belt or a hairpiece could just be the thing that does it. And sometimes things are simply practical matters, so knowing that you can get by with just a beret and a handful of clips instead of a matching headbow for each dress you're bringing is all there is to it. The only one you're trying to prove anything to is you. Don't push yourself unnecessarily just to prove a point, your energy really is better spent elsewhere. I speak from a place of experience, as someone who has gone to great lengths to prove a silly point sometimes, trust me on this!
To give a good example of someone working their collection to the absolute max requires both for that person to share their coords pretty regularly and a great deal of familiarity with them and with what they own. Otherwise, a lot gets lost to memory (outfit repeating or re-doing with very minor tweaks months apart aren’t the clearest to online bystanders) or simply isn’t obvious without being able to zoom very closely or see everything in person. And let’s be clear here, once you start paying attention, you’ll see that so many lolitas out there do it! Finding someone isn’t the problem, it’s noticing and not allowing yourself to be distracted that stops us from seeing it. One of the people whose style I greatly admire is @darkxdelirium. Her wardrobe incorporates all of the major lolita substyles, as well as several other styles of fashion in general, so without looking at her Instagram feed as a whole it’s easy to lose sight of the details. The moment you turn that distraction off, you will notice how she utilises basically every aspect of maximising your wardrobe’s potential that I’ve talked about. Look how different the IW OP coords feel, even though the overall styling remains simple and most of that impression comes from the hairstyle and accessories. Notice how swapping out the top half of an outfit gives the same JSK, tights and shoes base a makeover. And you should definitely stop to notice how often you can spot certain builder pieces (like shoes or legwear) reappear across various coords, unnoticed because they are seamlessly woven in with everything else in the outfit to form a whole look instead of being a box ticking exercise of ‘a coord needs X, Y and Z’.
Same OP, definitely two different coords. Link to the original left and right coords.
Layering is your friend when it comes to making coords feel different. See the original post here.
These Iris Corolla shoes are almost synonymous with Rococo-inspired coords - which doesn't mean that they're limited to those. See the left, middle, and right coords on Instagram.
Hopefully after reading this, whatever pressure you felt to go on a gigantic shopping spree has been eased. The last thing I want for anyone following this series is to feel like they have to do anything, let alone spend their hard-earned/saved money. Whilst I definitely want to encourage people to address genuine needs within their wardrobes (hence my banging on about the importance of builder pieces), do assess what is an actual gap that could help you make the most of the rest of your collection and what is a mere whimsy that could create more needs than fill them. Truth is that whilst owning more opens up possibilities, it can also create too many of them if you’re not set on a particular look or aren’t limited in any other way. So if you’ve found your niche within lolita fashion, the look that makes you the happiest and feel your best, a carefully planned out smaller collection of versatile and complimenting items will result in far more possibilities than going for a little bit of everything. There is maximising your options and then there is falling down the spiral of continually creating more and pushing the goal of ‘getting there’ further away. Find out what conditions you should meet to feel in your heart that you ‘got there’ and you’ll know the difference between these two.
In line with spring, this month’s Bibliotheca theme is growth. Recently that’s something that I’ve been doing a fair deal of, both on a personal level and within lolita fashion. This post isn’t going to be groundbreaking, just a couple of reflections on how my style and attitudes have been changing recently from what they used to be.
What Kind of Sweet
The biggest growth, which I was hoping to pinpoint through my wardrobe overhaul and somehow managed to nail down before that happened, was working out what kind of sweet lolita I like on myself best. For a while I’ve been struggling to discern if I’m falling out of love with sweet altogether (couldn’t be, I still love Diner Doll unconditionally) or with the individual dresses in my possession (Crystal Dream Carnival still had be conflicted, but more on that later). Turns out that the sweet that I like the most and that I want to focus my efforts on is the kitschy, vintage-inspired one, mostly with food-based prints and usually in primary colours, though I’m not opposed to pastels if they work with the print. Hence my relatively recent obsession with Meta’s Vintage Fruit, hence my holding out for The Black Ribbon’s upcoming konbini print, hence my falling out of love with Fantasy Theater (which I’m in the process of selling, the auction is ending within just a few hours, if you’re interested). Finally figuring this out has lifted a massive weight off my shoulders, I can now look at my wardrobe with that little bit more clarity and let go of things slightly more easily, as well as look forward to seeing my collection take that shape and be excited about that.
I hope that this will be mine sometime in the not too distant future, but I also know that I've gotten way too hung up on the idea of wearing this in summer and it may simply not happen like that. Image from Lolibrary.org
No Longer Not a Pink Lolita
If you fancy a trip down the rabbit hole that is this blog, then you will stumble across a post where I was talking about why I’m not into pink in lolita. Years later that same post served as a springboard to my discussing how lolita fashion was one of the things that helped me overcome a lot of internalised misogyny. And now, in 2022, I can confidently say that I’ve grown from being actively against pink on myself to actively being all for pink on myself. I may only own one pink main piece (and it’s a very light shade at that), but I’ve worn plenty of pink outfits with the various pink builder items that I own. Pink doesn’t scare me in sweet, it doesn’t scare me in classic, it doesn’t scare me in my looks outside of lolita either (where it’s actually a bit more prominent). If that’s not growth, then I really don’t know what is.
One of the pinkest coords that I've worn - and definitely one that I still like a lot!
Cool with Casual…
Back when I first got serious about lolita fashion, it was my fancy, going out-out clothing. Through the years lolita has grown to be a much bigger part of my style overall, first by influencing me to stop wearing trousers (excluding ouji), then by embracing it more and more as time went on. I’m certainly not a daily lolita right now, but I wear it regularly enough to consider myself a bit of a lifestyler. With that comes the acceptance that lolita can be both for special occasions and for daily activities. I’ve attended a wedding in lolita, as well as baked and cooked. There are lolita coords for special occasions and there are ones for lounging around in or for throwing your rubbish out in. From one extreme to the other, I’ve gone through the whole scale, which involved recognising, accepting, and embracing casual lolita as a thing that I do. If you’d have told me that back in, say, 2016 I wouldn’t have believed you.
This is the sort of coord that back at the beginning of my journey with the fashion I never envisioned myself wearing, let alone loving as much as I do.
… and Cool with Collecting
Don’t get me wrong, I still firmly believe that fashion and clothes are to be worn. This is my primary reason for keeping some clothes and parting with others. But recently (very recently even) I’ve remembered the various occasions when people would hold on to clothing for sentimental reasons, my Mum’s wedding dress being the prime example (fyi, she still fits it, good thirty years later, even better than she did then - why didn’t you pass me this gene, Mum?). As Crystal Dream Carnival kept nagging at me this way and that, with reason telling me to sell it and heart wanting to keep it, I remembered that at the end of the day… it’s my dress. I bought it. I can do whatever I want with it - which includes keeping it and not wearing it if that is my choice. Of course, I would prefer to see it worn plenty of times, but right now my preferences for cuts and my current style drift do not favour it. Yet since it’s just one dress and I’m not planning to start buying pieces as if they were museum items, it’s ok to keep it as a collector’s dress almost. If I ever do want to wear it, then I will. But if the thought of selling it is too much to bear and if I know that hunting it down again would cost me way more than what I paid for it, then I am ok with holding onto it. If that changes down the line, then so be it, future growth is inevitable. This is now and I am happy with that decision now.
She is so extra and I've accepted that she will make fewer appearances going forward. Doesn't mean that I love her any less. Image from Lolibrary.org
No doubt there have been other instances of my growing within this fashion, from as significant as finding my style and confidence within lolita to more individual ones like working out what cuts I like on myself and focusing on those. These four are the most recent ones and ones that I have been wanting to somehow talk about on this blog, yet haven’t found the right angle for them. So big thank you to Bibliotheca for the prompt that allowed me to shove all of those loose thoughts into one bag and share them with you. If you aren’t signed up to the Bibliotheca newsletter, then I highly recommend that you do. Once it’s out, you will see not only the other posts for this month’s prompt, but a roundup of what the Bibliotheca bloggers have been discussing on their blogs overall over the month of April.
Continuing on with this challenge on a one-per-month basis, we get to the section of prompts that focus on the smaller items that may not get as much love. And for once I actually did find not just one, but two that were never worn.
Click to enlarge
| Metamorphose Classical Sister OP | Innocent World Origa OTKs | offbrand shoes | Antique Beast headdress | Grimoire brooch | Voodoodolly ring | Dalao Home wig |
My never before worn accessories are the Antique Beast headdress and the Grimoire brooch. I have previously worn the white headdress, but haven’t yet had the chance to wear the black one. Most of my black bits, especially the truly gothic ones, are bought with the understanding that they will wait their turn until I feel sufficiently gothy, which can be a while. However, April played a joke on us right from day 1 by being pretty cold, which meant that I could wear the Classical Sister OP without overheating. From there it was just a small hop to make the coord gothic rather than classic by throwing black accents at it, of which the headdress was a big part. Also, not going to lie, once I had the dress, wig and headdress on, I felt like a child of Wednesday Addams and Amanda Buckley from The Addams Family Values - i am the fanfiction brought to life.
Actually, they are both my mothers spiritually, it'd be a lie to say that there isn't a bit of Amanda in me.
As for the brooch, it is such a teeny tiny piece that I picked up at the swap meet last September. By virtue of being so small, it could actually be a filler amongst other accessories, but it would be a shame to drown it out like that. So instead, rather than go for one of my other gothic brooches, I picked this one. It is intrinsically more classic than gothic, though I also kind of like that and feel that this is what makes it work with the coord better, since the dress can also work with either substyle.
This collar is also perfect for displaying brooches.
The rest of the coord is very simple. Partly due to my lacking in more traditionally gothic pieces (had it arrived in time, I would’ve added the black corset to this though). Partly due to liking the simpler gothic looks more over the heavily accessorised and super intricate ones. And partly due to pure practicality. As I already said, the day was cold, so I just wanted to be warm. It was also a work-from-home day, which meant that comfort was more important. The wig did have to come off relatively quickly as it had started to give me a headache, though everything else stayed on for pretty much the rest of the day.
And that is all there really is to say about this coord. Whilst I am very good with not letting main pieces sit around for too long before being worn, I could definitely be better about extending similar treatments to other sections of my collection. Accessories should be so easy to incorporate, yet by virtue of being small they so often fall between the cracks. As nice as it would be to make the promise to change now, chances are that this won’t stick. So instead I will simply promise to include accessories in my wardrobe cull, so that whatever I do keep does have a fair chance at being worn.
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