Dreaming of a Summer 2013 Lolita Wardrobe

Just like that, here in Connecticut, it's summer. Last week it was 40 degrees and today it's 79*! With the exception of about 3 days scattered through the last 2 weeks, we really don't see a whole lot of spring around these parts, there are still snow piles in parking lots that haven't had time to melt! Planning a spring wardrobe around here, where you maybe plan on pairing some paler colors with a nice cardigan to fight off the chill, is pretty much a pipe dream for me, and now, all of the sudden, it's time to think about what sort of wardrobe I want to wear this summer. So let's take a peek at the sort of wardrobe I'm dreaming of this summer!

The theme for this summer is a sort of lazy decadence with a touch of old school. It's a little bit Metamorphose and a little bit Juliette et Justine inspired, and probably a whole lot of rule breaking and style blending. It's not so much Rococo as previous seasons have been but rather more Romantic. 

Top row, left to right: Surface Spell, R Series, Elpress L, Classical Puppets, Baby the Stars Shine Bright (x2), Angelic Pretty, Ebay, Bodyline (x2)

Middle row, left to right: Classical Puppets, Offbrand, Bodyline, Moi Meme Moitie, Baby the Stars Shine Bright, Atelier Pierrot, Haenuli, Metamorphose, Surface Spell, R Series

Bottom row, left to right, offbrand, Antique Beast, Metamorphose, Putumayo, Surface Spell, Akane & Alois, Surface Spell, Baby the Stars Shine Bright, Antique Beast, Bodyline.

I've been really inspired lately by a lot of empire waisted, and even no-waisted A-line dresses that don't really require a ton of poof. This more carefree and less structured style of Lolita, that is frequently explored by the more "eccentric" Lolita brands, is really perfect for days that are just too damned hot to really feel like going the whole 9 yards, but you still want to feel like a princess. Hey, princesses can be lazy too.

As I mentioned a couple summers ago, I still am totally loving the idea of OPs in the summer, and would like to fancy them up a bit with some breezy chiffon, elegant accessories, and opulent prints this year. I feel like that definitely reflects the current year's crazy decadent styles, but is also evened out a bit by some simplier antique styled pieces. This past year as seen a huge increase in the popularity of smaller indie brands, and many times the current release that everyone is talking about is not so much one of the big brands as it is a small indie lolita brand! This has been absolutely fantastic and such a refreshing thing to see in the world of Lolita, and this summer wardrobe reflects that a bit with some of my favorite indie brand pieces. Good bye deco pastel cake bunnies and 3-pettis-at-once, and hello gold framed cats printed on chiffon and lacy underskirts!

Finishing Touches

An outfit is really made something special with a few finishing touches, and in the heat of summer, where you can't really keep adding layers of clothes to your coordinate, accessories and finishing touches really help make the look feel complete. So what sort of finishing touches will I be frantically hunting down for summer 2013?

Hats

There's currently a huge chiffon and organza trend that's been popping up within Lolita and other girly Jfashions, and Angelic Pretty recently released a very popular chiffon bonnet to go with an extremely popular print. The soft girly shades and antique styling of a bonnet like this would be perfect with a floaty pastel dress. A bonnet like this can look extremely childish, but with a loose wavy hairstyle, the bow tied behind the neck or to one side, and paired with a less poofy dress I think a bonnet like this can look more antique and less kawaii.

Boater hats are so 2010, we might as well toss them out in the garbage with all our fawn-fur accessories (Just kidding! Haven't I ever mentioned how trends in Lolita tend to stick around forever?), this summer I'd like to try a straw bowler hat instead! It has the same retro charm that made boater hats so popular, but it's something a little bit different, and a little less frequently seen. It's perfect for the Classic Lolita and even the Sweet Lolita who likes a little bit of Classic in their wardrobe. The boring black band can easily be replaced with a complimenting ribbon and tied in a cute bow, and further decorated with a faux flower or even a cute brooch.

For the more Gothically inclined section of my imaginary summer wardrobe, I'd like to pair my coordinates with a large black sun hat. Not a floppy straw hat (Hate them! They always remind me of 1970's pool parties, which is maybe the exact opposite of the look I'm going for), but a black straw hat with a nice wide brim that stays up. These are a bit of a pain to find online, because they tend to be of the trendier floppy variety, but black wide brimmed sun hats are something of an old lady garden party staple and can usually be found at places like Sears for about $25. I have a hat like this that I tied a big tulle bow onto and then managed to lose for a couple years that I hope to get the chance to wear this summer! Just like any hat, these can be dressed up with some ribbon and faux flowers to easily match any coordinate and be as casual or as extravagant as you need them to be! 

Jewelry

Rose bracelet on Etsy. Alice in Wonderland pocket watch necklace on Etsy.

With such elegant looking outfits, I feel like jewelry can be kept to a minimum, or at least, significantly less than a lot of post-deco trends. A long pendant necklace and a bracelet for bare arms are perfect summer accessories. Too much jewelry just means more gross places to get sweaty anyways.

Hair and Makeup

Can we make this summer the season we finally hang up our rainbow split wigs for good? There was a time when they were new that I found them novel, but after the millionth time of seeing them haphazardly coordinated with every possible Lolita dress in existence, I sort of never want to see one again. As Lolitas, we might still be pretty far away from giving up wigs (they're just so easy!), but it's pretty nice to see us slowly headed towards more natural looking wigs. I've been loving this trend in the past year or so of these frizzy "Mori Girl" wigs that basically look like you slept in several braids and you can get a pretty good au naturel hair style like this by doing just that!

From Bodyline

It would be fantastic to see makeup go the way of the wig this summer and look a big more natural than what has been popular for so long. I'd love to see less Gyaru inspired full face makeup in Lolita, and more softly made up faces. A little bit of a call to the antique doll inspired makeup of the angelic Old School Lolita. After all, I don't think anyone likes sweating under all that makeup.

Etude House nail polish.

Nail polish is a pretty great way to add some sparkle and color to a coordinate, without having to pack on the extra jewelry. I'm sure everyone with an internet connection in recent months has seen these gorgeous ice cream styled Etude House nail polishes! Luckily for everyone who can't get their hands on Korean nail polish, these are currently a pretty popular nail polish trend and can be found under a few different names, ranging from creamy glitter, jelly glittery, or chelly glitter. These creamy pastel polishes with a bit of a sparkle to them are great finishing touches to a dreamy pastel coordinate, even if it's not saccharine sweet.

The Count nail polish on Etsy.

If your wardrobe is more black-based, check out this absolutely gorgeous black polish from Literary Lacquers! It's a little something different from basic black and is a glittery shimmery black jelly polish. I just got this in the mail a few days ago and I can't wait to give it a whirl!

If you're prone to switching up your style on a frequent basis and can't really commit to either pastels or darker colors for more than a few days, try some fake nails! I recently got a pair of gorgeous fake nails for review from Bonita Bon Bon that I hope to get a full review of up sometime next week!

What sort of direction do you want your Lolita wardrobe to go this summer? Does the summer heat reflect how you wear Lolita, or do you just suffer for the fashion?

*I wrote this last week! It's since been back to 40 degrees or so. Thanks, New England!

Micro Post: New Layout!

If you haven't noticed, things are looking a little different over on F Yeah Lolita! I recently commissioned a picture to use as a banner from SugaryCarnevil and gave the blog a bit of a makeover. I was getting a little bit bored with looking at all that dusty salmon pink, and as much as I loved the previous banner from PetiteDeath/DarkDevi, it was time for a change! I know it's a pretty drastic change from the old theme, but I hope it's a little cleaner to navigate now. The only layout had a couple previous layouts worth of junk accumulated all over it!

I figure this is also a good time to point out some of the blog pages that I have linked up at the top that I haven't really mentioned before and have instead just sort of added to the blog without notice.

What is Lolita?: This is the place to go if you've sort of just stumbled onto the blog and Lolita in general. It has contains a collection of links called  F Yeah Lolita's Crash Course In Being A Successful Lolita, which features links to all the blog articles that a newbie might find useful if they want to get into the fashion and they want to get into it now and still know everything they possibly can.

Lolita on a budget: This section is just what it sounds like! A small collection of links that might be of interest to the Lolita who's on a tight budget.

Blogging resources: This is one of the newest pages I've added and it started as just a collection of links I was keeping for myself. It features a variety of links that might be of use to the other bloggers out there, including some links aimed specifically at Lolita bloggers and a collection of miscellaneous Lolita memes that you might find fun.

Tutorials: This section has been up for a while and it's definitely one I have fun updating! It's a pretty massive list of various craft, sewing, and beauty tutorials that are of use to any crafty Lolita out there. Anything from sewing your own dresses, to styling your hair, to doing makeup, to decoing everything you own will be found on this page!

Translations: I really enjoy reading translations of Japanese articles and even just web chatter about the Lolita fashion and this is a collection of various translations I've found. These range from Novala's essays from the late 90's, to translated Gothic Lolita Bible articles, to newspaper articles, to Japanese forum posts.

FAQ: Frequently asked questions! I love getting questions and emails from people, but I do tend to get a lot of the same questions, and some of the more frequent ones are answered here. The FAQ also answers some questions I've been getting about reviews and advertisements or promotions on F Yeah Lolita.

Silhouette vs. Aesthetic: What makes Lolita "Lolita"?

This post should be sub-subtitled: A continued debate on the question of whether or not petticoats are an absolute necessity within the Lolita fashion and the debate's effect on future generations of budding Lolitas. With a title like that, this post sounds positively Victorian. If this overly-long title hasn't sent you running and screaming "NO MORE!" away from your computer I hope to share my thoughts on this somewhat touchy subject that was making the rounds over on Tumblr somewhat recently. Yes, that's right, this post touches a bit on the great petticoat debate that I'm sure everyone is sick of already.

In my opinion, to answer the question "Are petticoats absolutely necessary to the Lolita fashion?" shortly and simply: No, they are not. You may now proceed to the comment section to let me know why I'm wrong if you feel the need to, or you can stay awhile and let me explain why!

Petticoats are important, but lucky for us this particular dress isn't the only one in the Lolita fashion.

Don't get me wrong, I think that a petticoat can make or break a borderline outfit Lolita, and lack of one can potentially ruin an otherwise completely fine Lolita outfit, but I think that there are a considerably large number of Lolita coordinates and dresses out there that don't necessarily need a petticoat to be considered Lolita. I feel that there's really no definitive thing you can say about petticoats being necessary throughout all of Lolita and it's definitely something that you need to take into consideration with each individual outfit.

Baby's iconic babydoll dress

For example, take the above dress, it's one of the most iconic Lolita dress designs out there, and a design that has been in production and regular wear by Lolitas, in perfectly Lolita coordinates, for well over a decade now. And yet, many people who own this dress (and the dozens of identically cut dresses) simply don't wear a petticoat with it. Myself included. And it's still, without a doubt, Lolita. A dress like this simply doesn't have enough poof to fit a regular petticoat, and if you try to wear one, it will typically look overstuffed. When I wear a dress like this, I'll just wear a plain Lolita skirt under it (which for me, is mostly to add a couple inches to the bottom of it), and that combined with the built-in lining of the skirt and the gathers gives it enough lift to not be swishy. People do sometimes argue: "but that's just because this is such an old design, if it was released now, people would call it not-Lolita!", personally I find this argument to be completely moot.  The fact of the matter is that this style of Lolita dress does exist and was a majorly influential and popular Lolita design for years and still continues to be.

 

Those that do own this type of dress and do wear it with a petticoat tend to wear it with a deflated tulle one, which does absolutely nothing for the poof, and functionally, looks exactly the same as wearing nothing under it. To those of you saying "But that counts because even a deflated petticoat is still a petticoat!" then what is the point at all of saying that a Lolita outfit needs a petticoat to be considered Lolita, even if that petticoat does absolutely nothing? At this point the petticoat becomes a completely arbitrary clothing item that cannot be seen and may or may not effect the look of the outfit in the slightest, you may as well say that Lolita can be defined by whether or not someone is wearing a ribbon tied around their waist under their dress. I feel that the importance of a petticoat stems not from the fact that it gives skirts a particular silhouette, especially considering Lolita skirts can come in a number of shapes and lengths and be deemed acceptable, but because it is part of a more general aesthetic that is far more important than mere shape.

If you want to see a few examples of Lolita without the poof, check out the blog No Petticoat Needed! It's more of an otome blog but there are a few Lolita outfits showcased. 

Not a cupcake.

So what makes something Lolita, if not the silhouette? There is obviously more to Lolita than just the shape of a skirt. If it was the only defining feature, Lolita wouldn't be such a tricky fashion for people to get into, filled with "Is this Lolita?" questions about every offbrand skirt with flare. The truth is that there are a lot of little things combined that make Lolita what it is. There's a certain aesthetic that Lolita undoubtedly has, in addition to the silhouette, even if that aesthetic is different throughout the different Lolita sub-styles.

The truth is, Lolita isn't something that can be enirely defined by a few quick words, or a chart pointing to different style elements, or even a single blog post, no more than any other fashion can be. The importance of the petticoat is that it is part of the elegance and opulence of the Lolita aesthetic, even interpreted through the ultra kawaii or edgy and deconstructed sub-styles of the fashion.

That being said, just like any of the other aspects of the Lolita aesthetic, I feel like petticoats are part of a sort of sliding scale of Lolitaness. Similar to how a relatively plain loliable dress devoid of common Lolita details can be perfectly Lolita if it's coordinated properly, a dress with iconic Lolita elements, and coordinated with undeniably Lolita items, can still be Lolita even if it doesn't have the traditional silhouette.
   But think of the newbies!
This is all too often what you hear when someone says they think petticoats are optional, as well as any number of other Lolita fashion "rules". The truth is, Lolita is sometimes an overwhelming fashion and sometimes newbies (and even not-so-newbies!) might make some choices that might not exactly be the best, and having a set of guidelines is a good idea for the fashion to help anyone interested in wearing the fashion. However, we have to remember to stress that these are guidelines, and not rules. As someone who's been into the fashion for a very long time, and have had the chance to see how the community changes with the years, one particularly troublesome thing I've noticed is that when you lay down rules for newbies, those newbies grow into Lolitas assuming that these rules are set in stone.

Back in about 2006/2007 there was a very strong emphasis in the community on what is and isn't Lolita. The Western Lolita communities began questioning what it was that made something Lolita and were trying to, as a community, nail down the style. This was a pretty awesome thing for the community to be finally considering, however a lot of the "rules" that came from this era of new found self-reflection have stuck for many people as being the only way to define Lolita.

How often have you heard someone say that all Lolitas must wear blouses at all time, skirts may not be more than a certain number of inches above your knee, black and white dresses are instant Ita, or any number of rules touted as a set-in-stone truth? There's a pretty good chance that people believe these things to be absolute truths because, when they were first getting started, someone tried to steer them away from Itadom, but neglected to mention that, yeah, they're not really rules at all. Personally, I've heard such silly things more times than I care to. It's all well and fine to help a newbie out, especially in such a tricky fashion like Lolita, and especially with cringe-worthy scratchy lace skeletons hanging in so many of our own closets that we would like to spare other newbies from, but we have to remember to emphasize that these are not rules, but rather "learn to crawl before you can run" guidelines.

In emphasizing the importance of the silhouette above all else, I feel that many people have disregarded the general aesthetic of the fashion, leading to a lot of really watered down ideas of what makes something Lolita. I feel that this over-emphasis is just as misleading for budding generations of Lolita as the other rules have been.

So how do you help newbies?

I recently asked EGL what people there considered the rules or defining features of Lolita to be, and one user, Carmidoll, brought up a very interesting idea: that Lolita can really only truly be learned through osmosis. This seems like a somewhat weird idea, but I realized that it's probably how we all truly learned how to define what Lolita is. By reading the Bibles, by searching for street snaps, by lurking Daily Lolita, by reading Lolita blogs, by talking about it with other Lolitas online, or by participating in our Local community. Lolita is really an immense fashion, and defined by so much more than just how high above your knees your poofy skirt lands that it's almost impossible to take in by reciting what amount to arbitrary fashion rules. It's really something we can only know after we've experienced it in some way.

If you have a friend who is interested in getting into Lolita and doesn't quite know where to start, by all means, let them know that it's a good idea to wear a petticoat, or that full-length dresses and barely-butt-covering skirts probably isn't the best choice for a Lolita outfit, remind them that some JSKs might look more put together with a blouse, but avoid trying to define the fashion by these things. Instead, share your Bibles with them, gush over newly released dresses with them, discuss trends and fads with them, even share clothes with them if you can. The best way to learn what Lolita's about is to participate in it in whatever way you can.

The funny thing about this topic is that most people can't really agree on it! I find it funny that when a bunch of perfectly well put-together Lolitas get together and talk about the defining features of Lolita, most of them have completely different opinions on the subject. How can a group of people who are all very obviously involved in the same fashion and wear it just fine all be saying contradictory things on what it is that makes an outfit Lolita? If they all simply have the wrong idea on what is and isn't Lolita, how is it they seem to have a perfectly acceptable grasp on the fashion?

What are your thoughts on the subject? Do you think petticoats are mandatory or optional providing the outfit is right? Or to go above and beyond that, do you feel that not only are petticoats mandatory, but only specific shapes and lengths are? What exactly do you personlly find the defining features of Lolita to be?

Blogspiration: Juliette et Justine Fashion Shows, An Indie Lolita Design Contest, Lolitaopoly, and some upcoming Conventions!

Look at that! I managed to make another one of these link roundup posts in considerably under 6 months. I have a few random things to share with you all, in addition to some neat stuff I've stumbled across online, that I didn't want to bother with a whole new post with, so why not more blogspiration posts?

The UK Lolitas have a pretty large and active community, adorably called the Tea Party Club, and a few months ago they were lucky enough to get the chance to host a Juliette et Justine fashion show. They pictures are just now hitting the internet and you can check them out here. Juliette et Justine is such a stunning and opulent brand, so it's really amazing to get to see so many dresses from them all in one place, and done up so elaborately for a show like this! I seriously wish I had a local community that was able to pull off a feat like this!

If there are any aspiring designers and artists out there, the indie brand Pop Princesses is hosting a contest that is open for just a couple more days, that allows artists to submit their portfolios for a chance to work on an upcoming print with them! Check out this post for some more info on it. It could be a great chance to work with a skilled seamstress and make those burando dreams come true!

So, I was going to make this post earlier today, but I got a bit lazy and I'm really into MST3K and Rifftrax, so I kinda slacked off today because it was frozen and snowing out and watched a bunch of old Rifftrax, but I am really glad I held off (not just because I got to watch those Rifftrax) because I stumbled across this completely amazing project by Misirlou, of a Lolita version of monopoly called Lolitopoly. Seriously, check out this post! It looks completely stunning and hilarious. I want to be able to play this game so bad, it looks like a complete blast to play!

I absolutely have a soft spot in my heart for old school styled Lifestyle Lolita lists of cute ideas, so I was pretty pleased when I stumbled across this list of Princess Tips: 25 Spring Lifestyle Ideas. Spring is actually a lot further around the corner than I want to even think about, but these ideas are still really adorable, and a lot of them are really appropriate for any time of year, provided you're into the Lolita Lifestyle.

I actually stumbled across this post, It's Cosplay, Not C******, on an otaku culture blog I am particularly fond of, and it's about Cosplay vs. historical costuming, but I feel like a lot of what she says is very relevant to the Lolita too. Obviously the major difference between Cosplay and Lolita, is that Lolita isn't always, or even less than 90% of the time, a costume but more of a "Yeah, this is just what I wear" thing, but it's still a very interesting read and definitely something a lot of us have heard before coming from other people who dress outside what is considered "normal". I'd like to share the following quote from the post:

"It doesn’t matter if you play a character who was a queen 400 years ago, or you play one who will be queen of future Tokyo in a millenium. What matters is this is a hobby people are drawn to for their own reasons. As long as they’re having fun and not harming anyone, lets knock off the elitism and let them have their fun. It’s a big enough sandbox for us all to play with our toys together."

In F Yeah Lolita news, I've added an extra, and hopefully helpful, page to the site! Blogging Resources is a one-stop page for, you guessed it, resources for bloggers. I have been hoarding a lot of useful sites for myself to reference now and again, so I figured I would share them with the rest of you. The sites linked range from helpful blog coding sites, to Lolita specific memes, to blog posts others have written about being a blogger, to just sort of useful kawaii images. I'll be adding some new stuff as I find it, so if you're a blogger, you might want to check back now and again!

My final "OMG, guys, check this out!" is some fun news for me! It's just about convention season and I've managed to snag a couple tables at some upcoming conventions.

The most recent convention is actually only a couple of weeks away! The third year of U-con at Uconn is coming up on February 16th and 17th. U-con at Uconn is a completely free convention that's put on by our state's college. It's a small-ish 2 day con that has, I believe, between 700 and 1,000 people in attendance for the previous years. It's free and it's fun, and I'll be selling some stuff in the dealers room and just generally hanging out and doing con stuff. If you're in the area, stop by and say hi!

 The next con is actually a few months away, at the end of May, but it's one of my absolute favorites of the year, Anime Boston. I just got the news that I will get the chance to have a table in the Artist Alley this year, and I'm very excited for it! I have no idea where I'll be yet, or even what sort of stuff I'll be selling, but I just know I'm happy to get the chance to go back. I absolutely love the Lolita events that go down at Anime Boston!

I'd also like to mess around in this post a bit with link parties. If you're unfamiliar with the term (and you probably are unless you lurk around a bunch on craft blogs like I do!) it basically just means you get the chance to add your link directly to this blog post!

Victorian Beauty Secrets for the Lolita

The Victorian times have been over-romanticized pretty much ever since the era ended, and those decades definitely weren't all scented gloves and garden tea parties. It's important to know that and understand the difference between taking a few cues from the lighter sides of the romanticized Victorian life and believing that these cues are the be-all-end-all of Victorian life and judging others harshly for not living their life like you choose to live yours. We've all heard this said from another somewhere or another before: "In the Victorian era, ladies didn't do _____, so Lolitas shouldn't either". Well, Victorian era ladies generally wore skirts that covered their knees (and shins, and ankles) and refrained from wearing pirate hats and head wear that looks like melting ice cream, so maybe we don't need to take every lifestyle cue from the Victorians.

However, the Victorian era has undoubtedly been a major influence in the Lolita fashion, and even lifestyle. While most Lolitas are content to keep the Victorian limited to their wardrobe and maybe decor choices, there are those that are interested in living a little more historically accurate. Personally, I'm very interested in beauty routines and recipes from the past, particularly of the Victorian era. I find them very interesting, and they're generally a very unobtrusive way to add an element of the Victorian to your life without having to change the way you act or invest in some majorly expensive antique furniture. 

One of my favorite beauty gurus of the era is Mrs. Harriet Hubbard Ayer, who wrote a book simply called Harriet Hubbard Ayer's Book. As someone who enjoys digging through old beauty books (thank you, the internet and pre-1923 copyright laws!) I'm familiar with the dry and often times ridiculous sounding beauty routines from the era, so I was pleasantly surprised to find Mrs. Ayers book, published first in 1899, not only very readable, but I enjoyed her particular style of writing and personality, and I also found her beauty routines to be very modern sounding, realistic, and generally most of them were not dangerous or even very weird (ok, so maybe baby head-gear to make sure they don't grow up with big ears is a little weird).

The majority of Mrs. Ayer's recipes were something along the lines of a cream, lotion, or fragranced oil or powder. Wax, oil, talc, fragrance, scrubby crushed nuts, rose water, and glycerin are commonly found ingredients in Mrs. Ayer's recipes. Not very different in composition from the multitude of recipes for homemade body butters and scrubs you can find by the hundreds on Pinterest. Personally, I don't even think it's necessary to go strictly historically accurate with these recipes, as the modern home recipes are similar enough (mostly, you're simply going to find a lot less sperm whale fat in modern recipes) so that your best bet would just be to find a modern home made soap, lotion, or whatever it is you feel you could use to suit your needs.

If you're looking for some more in-depth looks at beauty advice from around this era, check out The Gibson Girl's Guide to Glamor, a blog that focuses on beauty tips and recipes from about 1890-1915, and includes dozens and dozens of real-life applications and adventures in recreating the recipes found in these old books!

If you want to do your own hunting and searching, there are a number of old beauty books available for free online at Archive.org. Below are a few of the ones I have found and enjoyed digging through. However, there are dozens more available, just search around antique book archive sites for keywords such as "ladies", "beauty" or "toilet" and you're bound to find some!

• Female Beauty: or, the art of human decoration (1874)
• The Ugly-Girl Papers: or, hints for the toilet (1874)
• Manners, culture and dress of the best American society, including social, commercial and legal forms, letter writing, invitations,etc, also valuable suggestions on self culture and home training (1891)
• Woman’s Own Book of Toilet Treatments (unknown date)
• The Arts of Beauty: or, Secrets of a lady’s toilet (1858)
• Health, Beauty and the Toilet: Letters to ladies from a lady doctor (1886)
• Practical Hand-Book of Toilet Preparations and their uses. Also Recipes for the Household (1889)
• Harriet Hubbard Ayer's book; a complete and authentic treatise on the laws of health and beauty (1902)

If you do plan on attempting any of the recipes or advice you find in any of these old books, please use common sense and a bit of Googling to see if what you're about to do is safe! Not every practice from the past is a safe "old timey home remedy", ladies of ages past (as are ladies of the current age) are often infamous for doing dangerous things in the name of beauty. Many of the recipes and advice in such books are only good for interesting reading, not necessarily for slathering all over yourself and ingesting.

Do you have any particularly Victorian inclined beauty routines? I'm trying to get more into making my own beauty products and going a bit more natural with the ones I use. I sort of really love Lush products and have been lurking around the internet for recipes that are similar to the products I love so I can make. I've already made a ton of different salt and sugar scrubs (and prompted used them almost all up!), as well as a dry shampoo. I want to step it up a bit for my next attempt at a recipe and try making something like a lotion bar, or that witch hazel cold cream!

Lolita Blog Carnival: If I Had A Lolita Themed Cafe...

This week's Lolita Blog Carnival was one I was really looking forwards to! This week's topic is...

Ok, so my graphic is worded a little bit differently than the actual topic because I managed to completely forget the name of this week's theme as soon as I opened up Photoshop, but they say about the same thing!

If I had my own Lolita themed cafe, the theme would be a bit of a mix between Classic and Gothic. Think the deep jewel tones with some hints of dusty pastels and lots of antiqued gilt of Classic, but with some of the more morbid motifs of Gothic.The cafe itself would have a couple separate areas to it, but would generally be small and cozy, but with enough room to get around in petticoats!

The main area would be the actual cafe. It would contain about half a dozen round bistro tables with fancy cast iron legs and a dark wood table top and similarly designed chairs. There would be a small Victorian styled sofa or love seat off to one wall, upholstered in a jewel toned velvet or brocade and would be decorated in a way that practically screamed "This is the perfect place to take our outfit shots!". It would be, of course, a very well lit sofa. The walls would be papered in dark Victorian styled wallpaper and sprinkled heavily with art and prints from girly pop surreal artists and a few antique photos and prints thrown in for good measure.

There would be a small boutique area as well! It would mostly stock indie brand pieces, ranging from unique jewelry to accessories to even dresses and skirts. The smaller pieces would be mostly under a glass display case, or arranged artfully on the counter, while the clothing items would be hung up on a round clothes rack with a half-dress makers dummy decked out in on top of it.

The menu would feature gourmet teas and coffee and would include some thematically appropriate blends, like the kind of teas offered by Grey Brews. Besides tea and coffee the cafe would offer a rotating menu of small pastries and other treats that go well with tea and coffee. To take a cue from the EGL Comm's blog about this topic, food and drinks would be served in dainty, but miss-matched, tea cups and saucers.

The staff would, of course, wear matching uniforms! I've always loved the button-on aprons and this particular Maxicimam set is perfect! The black bows on the front and extra details and buttons on the apron of it make it a little less pure Sweet Lolita than Angelic Pretty's more popular version of this type of dress and apron. To Gothic it up a little more, it would be paired with black shoes, these particular harlequin socks, and Antique Beasts famous bat/cat maid headdress. The outfit would be further sprinkled through with red accessories, each waitress adding her own personal touch in this way. Bloomers are an absolute must in this case! 

Want to see more hypothetical Lolita themed cafes? Check out the rest of the participating blogs! And while you're at it, click the tent above to check out the LBC's Facebook page.

♡ Sweet and Simple ♡ EGL Community ♡ Geisha Baby ♡ Lace Jail ♡ Lace a la Mode ♡ Beyond Kawaii ♡ Sunshine In Our Hands ♡

Lolita52: How Lolita Has Changed Me

I've already managed to slide into laziness with the Lolita 52 meme and get my second question in on what is technically the last day of the 2nd week! However, I'm excited to see that the other bloggers that are participating in this meme aren't being as lazy as I am and I'm really enjoying seeing the topics pop up on blogs.

This week's prompt out of the jar-o-questions is "How Lolita has changed me". Questions similar to this end up on a lot of Lolita memes and questionnaires, but usually they're in the form of "How have you changed since you first discovered Lolita". Personally, it's been a long time since I discovered Lolita, so that's a pretty difficult question to answer. This way, I thought it was a little more direct. 

Lolita has changed me probably too many ways to count, and a lot of this probably does have to do with that whole "discovered Lolita back in the dawn of time" thing, and it is a bit hard to tell in which ways Lolita has changed me, and in which ways time has simply changed me. But let's take a look at some of the major ways that Lolita has changed me!

Shopping

The most major change Lolita has done to me is the way I shop! I no longer really feel the need to pick up random items for a cheap price just because. Since I got heavily into Lolita my major concern when adding items to my wardrobe is "Can I wear this with my Lolita wardrobe?" and "If I'm buying this now, is it going to prevent my from buying Lolita later?" If the answer is "No I can't wear this with my current Lolita wardrobe, and if I get it I wont be able to get Lolita later" there's a 95% chance I'll put it back. I make very few non-Lolita related "I want this just to have it" purchases now.

Does that mean Lolita saves me money? Haha, oh gosh no. That just means I save all those gotta have it, don't know what to do with it purchases for when I'm lurking the sales communities.

Crafting

I love doing various crafts and Lolita has definitely changed the way I craft. While I've obviously picked up a ton of new crafts because they help me add things to my Lolita wardrobe, there are adversely a number of crafts that I think are cool, but will most likely never end up bothering with because they're not Lolita crafts. Now, this isn't to say I have some sort of weird Lifestyle Lolita urge to only do Lolita appropriate historically accurate crafts, just that they're things that look neat to do, but I can't figure out any way to make them produce things for my Lolita wardrobe.

I recently discovered Random Tutorial Generator, a site that lets you press a button to get a new random craft tutorial. This is such a cool site and it shows you so many awesome tutorials you may have never found (and also a really obnoxious amount of baby related tutorials. I am pretty thankful that I don't need to know how to make cloth diapers or whatever a burpee is, but pretty annoyed that sometimes I have to press that big red button close to a dozen times before it decides to stop it's romp through babyland) and I love to spend a good chunk of time just clicking around to find new ones. However, every time something like, say, a spiked friendship bracelet pops up, I get super excited because it looks so fun to make and I have all the supplies, but oh, wait, when am I ever going to wear a spiked friendship bracelet? Never, because they totally clash with my grandma couch floral print dresses.

Friends-ing

Lolita has also definitely changed the friends I have and how I make them! I can't even imagine how weird getting together, and in some cases traveling pretty far, to hang out with people you have never met before to talk about clothes would be outside of Lolita. I was looking through my phone's contacts for something the other day and it struck me how many people I have in my phone that includes their internet handle because that's what I know them by most of all!

Through Lolita I have made a ton of great friends, and the social nature of Lolita often pushes me to go out and do something social when I would otherwise just be hanging around avoiding doing social things. Even just in online communities, where I am typically inclined to just lurk, I'm now more willing to actively participate because of the positive experiences I've had in online Lolita communities.

What about the rest of you? In what sort of specific ways has Lolita changed yourself? Do you find that Lolita just so happens to line up perfectly with your own personality and habits, or has it changed you for the better, or perhaps even the worse?

For those of you who want to check out the other topics in this weekly meme, check out the original post on it, or keep an eye on the Lolita 52 tag!