This week I went to Harajuku with my friends. Harajuku is a representative place for youth fashion in Tokyo. Even before we arrive at Harajuku, on the subway to there, there are already many people who dressed very fashionable, even somehow weird to me. Since Harajuku is very popular among tourists as well as local people, it became so crowded on subways and huge groups of people got off at the Harajuku station. Once we got out of the train station, the streets looks so different compared to those around ICU. The streets are filled with people with all kinds of hairstyles and hair colors. Girls, even some male people, wear bold makeups and dress up. An interesting theme is that every people just walk on their own way without questioning others’ looks. The shops along the streets are all very unique. I see in Harajuku a great acceptance and confidence of people’s own understanding of fashion.
Harajuku’s street full of people looking from a pantry shop
My favorite fashion brand’s window display in Japan
Indeed, I have been interested by the Japanese sense of beauty. On the one hand, Japanese people seems to like extreme beauty. Girls and sometimes middle aged women often make their cheeks outstandingly red using blushers. Last weekend my friends and I went to プリクラ (Japanese photo booth) to experience the legendary “cosmetic surgery machine” (because the photo adjusts faces so much). Even though we tried minimal adjustment, our eyes were like twice as big and our chin were like knives. It was a cute and funny experience but we did not look like ourselves in photos at all. On the other hand, Japanese people also seems to pursue natural beauty. I recently saw a news talking about the most beautiful high school girl selected by the Japanese public. Far from what I described above, she looked very natural, and not so outstandingly beautiful that some of my Chinese friends joked that they might defeat her. I also wondered about Japanese people’s criteria of beauty and so I went to ask some Japanese friends. According to them, instead of stressing the point “sexy” in many western countries, Japanese people value “healthy beauty” more. They think youth should be 元気 lively and they like 可愛い cute girls. There are people who are very bold in expressing themselves, but the large population prefer to be natural in dressing in normal days. That’s why I see many people dressed elegantly with makeups so delicate that I could not tell if it is natural skin or makeup from distance.
I feel that fashion in Japan is such a colorful and amazing topic that I wish to explore more. No wonder why many designers find their inspiration from Japan.