Crimson Reflections

I might have bought 8 more dresses. This time only 7 of them are for me though? I do want to take a moment to say that buying 15 dresses in 2 months is a lot and not at all normal (for me or in general for lolita fashion). A lot of what I have in my wardrobe right now that is newer is too big for me, and a lot of what I have that is my current size that is spring/summer appropriate is stuff I’ve been wearing for years that is becoming pretty shabby. I needed to buy new things to replace what is worn out, and I’ve been wearing the few ETC and LG pieces I have already a lot recently. The prices are really good right now, so I made the decision to buy a bunch of pieces at a good price all at once, instead of buying things more gradually over time. I also specifically was looking for pieces I could wear to work in the summer.

First up, closet child sent this one in a separate plastic bag from the rest of the dresses. Typically they put all the dresses in a plastic bag and put it into a box, but there were two plastic bags inside my package, and one of them just had this dress. This is never a good sign. This is the Chambre Print JSK from 2013. Closet child had it listed for 4,400 yen (~$28) and for quality, the rank of the item was B, with no specific notes. Immediately on opening it smelled like cigarette smoke. I put it on the dress form really quick to take photos and immediately my cats came over to smell the bad smell.

It went straight into a bucket of laundry sanitizer, oxyclean and woolite to soak for a few hours, and after a good rinse, I’m happy to report the smell is gone.

Next up is Vintage Trump Print High Waist Switching JSK from Leur getter. This was 5,500 yen (~$34 USD) and was marked as B rank condition with the only note being that it was wrinkled.

This was super wrinkled in the packaging, and I could immediately tell it wasn’t having the best time, so I started out steaming it to better asses the damage. Firstly, and most obviously, the waist bow is holding on by a thread… quite literally. I’m probably going to let gravity win and remove it entirely, then put it on a pin or two way clip instead. I want to clip the damaged tacking stiches on the top and see if it’s super floppy without them. If so, I might just sew it back down. If not, I think having it on a pin or maybe a barrette will work out better for me. I spend a lot of my time at work sitting at a desk, so waist bows like this just get bent over time, and removing it will give me more styling options, like using a belt.

Secondly, there are pulled threads in several places on the skirt, and to make matters worse, it’s a thick fabric and the printing didn’t saturate through most of the thread. That means that if a thread rotates, it shows as white. I started off trying to work some of the threads back to their proper location with a pin, but quickly found that the thread did indeed get rotated, and it was quite difficult to get it going the right way. Wiggling the fabric to get the thread to work it’s way back to where it naturally wanted to sit helped a lot after I got some of the tension relaxed, but I also noticed that sometimes it pulled more when I did that instead, which is something I’ve not seen before. To make matters worse, a few threads are pulled all the way out and just dangling on the front. I think my plan of attack is going to be to use a need to bring those threads through to the back, fray check them, and give up on them. The other threads that are pulled, but not broken, I’ll have to work on some more.

There are also stress marks where one of the buttons is (which will show once I move the button to make it fit me), and one of the corners of the bow has a stress mark already (another reason I want to move it to a lower stress area than the waist).

As a reminder, this listed no damage except for wrinkles. Here are the two photos from Closet Child. There were no closeup photos showing damage, and I don’t really see the pulled threads in these. At least steaming helped. I’m not thrilled about the condition of this one. It’s pretty rare to get something from Closet Child and have it be much worse than expected. I’m used to this going the other way. It is for sure the same dress though, because the print placement on the bodice and the straps is identical. A lot of the damage is towards the side seam on the right though, and that’s mostly not in the photos. At least it was cheap.

This is Vintage Camisole JSK (2019) from Leur Getter, which was a re-release of a bunch of prints in a simple JSK with pockets! It was 13,200 yen (~$84), and marked as rank B, with a note that the waist ribbon was missing. I was pleasantly surprised to find that it was actually new with tag, and just missing the sash. I wear this style with vintage-style belts half the time anyways, and if the sash was the same as the normal OP it would have just been a rose pink ribbon and my other Vintage Camisole JSK from my last order had one of those, so they can share.

Next up is Picnic Print Camisole JSK from LG. This was 6,600 yen (~$42 USD) and listed as B-rank with no specific issues. In person, the waist ribbon was really mangled. And a section of the strap ribbon was folded over inside the ladder lace. I started off trying to steam the waist ribbon, but it was really creased badly so I decided to just wet the whole thing down entirely to see if it was salvageable. I soaked it and then used my fingers to flatten it out. This worked really well and it’s air drying now. It’s a little fuzzy from being used, but it’s not bad. The strap I flattened out and pinned, then steamed and while there is a shadow of the crease, it’s much improved. Washing it probably will release it, at least I’m hopping so.

This is the JAM Gingham Camisole JSK from ETC. I paid 11,000 yen (~$70 USD) and it was marked rank B. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this that I can find. I really love the little ribbon detail on this dress. The only thing I don’t love about this dress is that the jars are opaque milk glass. I want them to be full of visible jam!

This is the Strawberry Print Waist Ribbon Camisole JSK from Leur Getter. It was 7,700 yen (~$48 USD) and this one was also marked as B-rank, waist ribbon missing. The waist ribbon for it was just a big wide satin ribbon sash and I would not have worn that with this dress, so I really don’t care that it’s missing. I have a wide grosgrain waist ribbon in red from another dress I can pair with it, and a red belt, so I’m not lacking options.

This is the Sweet Strawberry Camisole JSK from Leur Getter. It was 12,100 yen (~$75 USD) and listed as B-rank with no specific issues. It honestly looks like new in person. It has a really cute bow at the waist with a little metal charm on it, and the general look of the dress is pretty subdued, so I think this one is a great candidate to wear to work.

Lastly is the piece that isn’t for me. I ordered Emily Temple Cute’s Crown BUNNY OP in Purple for Michelle. I paid 11,000 yen (~$70). Closet child ranked it as a B-rank item, and noted that the original price was ￥26,784. In person it doesn’t seem unused, but it’s in perfectly good shape, and it’s super cute and airy.

Ok, so, I placed this order on June 9th, 2024​​, and my total was 84,998 yen (~$529 USD) with shipping. The shipping was 13,348 yen (~$83 USD) with 150 yen (~$0.93 USD) for insurance. Yes, that’s 93 cents for insurance.

On June 10th, I got an email from Paypal with a refund of 3,780 yen ($23.50 USD) due to the shipping cost they charged me being more than 1,000 yen over the cost they paid. This happened with the last ETC/LG order I made from Closet Child so I was kinda expecting it to happen again. As I mentioned last time, these items are very light weight, much lighter than the average AP dress.

So that brought my total down to 81,218 yen (~$505 USD). For that price, I got 8 dress, one of them being new with tags. The retail value of these pieces new was 228,655‬ yen (~$1,423 USD). That means if I average it all out, I got this all for about 70% off of retail. (Obviously the discount was better for some items than others).

The package shipped 06/11/2024 14:05 and arrived at my home in the US on 06/14/2024 12:47. So, just like last time, it was a total of 5 days from when I purchased it until it was in my hands. Now, granted, I did pay about $50 in shipping for EMS to get this to me in 3 days, but still, that’s pretty fast.