Crimson Reflections

I’m trying to jump back into blogging after a while and what better way than to pick back up with a topic from the 52 week lolita challenge that I started *checks notes* January of 2013. For those who are not aware (and at this point, is anyone???), the 52-week lolita challenge is a set of 52 writing prompts that you are supposed to do one-per-week for a year. It was created by Caro on FyeahLolita in 2013. I managed 14 in the first year, 2 more in 2014, 1 in 2017, 2 in 2019, and 1 in 2020. Which means I am currently at… 20/52 after approximately 650 weeks.

At some point, I started draft posts for a bunch of the prompts so I would know which ones I had left. And I think I should indulge past me and follow through on some of them. This particular prompt has a companion: Trends I Thought I Would Never Get Into, But I Now Love, which I wrote in November of 2020.

#1 The Most OTT Lolita

This is something that I could probably do a whole post on because I have very complicated thoughts on the matter, but basically, I love good OTT lolita coords. What I don’t love is when people put more emphasis on being the most OTT over having a good coordinate.

For example, an intricate handmade headdress made of high quality materials that matches with the coord and flows? Amazing. Wonderful. Love it. Something made of paper or other poor quality materials that can be viewed from a single angle and you have to take off immediately because it’s causing you pain? That feels bad.

I don’t like the pressure that social media puts on people to be more and more and more outrageous and how that has transforms OTT coords into things that are unwearable.

The same goes for the brands making the cheaper versions of the wedding lolita dresses that brands like Baby charge thousands of dollars for. You have to spend a certain amount of money to make something very OTT and have it look good, and it’s OK to go more simple if you don’t want to spend that amount of money. I’m never going to tell someone they can’t buy something like that and wear it if they want to, but I personally have always been more of a fan brands that keep prices low by making more affordable design choices (ex: fabric ruffles instead of lace, cheaper solid textiles over custom prints, etc) instead of using busy designs to try to hide crappy materials.

#2 Twinning

Twinning is so cute! And so hard. I don’t want to twin with anyone. My ex and I used to try to twin, but we were different heights / builds so it was hard to find clothes we both could wear and even when we did, the photos never looked like the “classic” twinning photos do. I’m also not very photogenic and I feel like there is a lot of pressure to take a good photo when you are twinning!

Meanwhile, twinning with other people I’m less close to is… stressful to me. Because I’ve been wearing lolita for over a decade and my clothes are various different sizes because I’ve been different sizes over the years. So someone will be like “we both have (dress name) and this bolero let’s twin!” and I’ll be like a deer in the headlights because that dress or bolero doesn’t currently fit me. But also, the pressure! Twinning is just so, so, so stressful to me. I hate it. I want to like it, but I really hate it.

#3 Sack Dresses

In theory, I love sack dresses. They are light and airy and comfortable.

In practice they look so bad on me. I look like a toddler wearing a dress that is too short. I want to be a person who can pull these off and wear these cute minimalistic sack dress coords with little casual hair bow clips.

But alas that life is not for me…

All in all though, I think it’s pretty rare for me to think I’ll like a trend and then hate it later. I think it’s far more common for things to grow on me over time than the opposite. A lot of people talk about getting sick of trends over time, especially when they are over done, but for me, I think things just become dear and nostalgic. I attach a lot of memories to objects, so when I see things like my 6% Dokidoki star clips, I think about the beautiful memories I have from times when I wore them. Even things which are tied to memories that are painful now are precious to me in their own way.

Are there any trends that you thought you would love, but later changed your mind on?