/cgl/ - Cosplay & EGL

>>9454525

If we're talking brand as in Meta, Baby, AP etc, then it's going to be hard.

A huge part of it is history. Look, these brands are so old, there’s probably a whole generation of lolitas younger than the companies themselves. You can’t even describe lolita history without marking some of them with brand releases — the rise of OTT pastel sweet can be tied to AP, Shimotsuma Monogatari comes with btssb releases, Meta is the first brand to ship overseas, etc etc. At this point the brands are pretty solidly part of lolita history.

Brands outside of Japan? I’ve watched the rise and fall of ITS, La Dauphine, and many others. I was here when taobao brands were only making replicas of varying quality. I was here when some indies were just some seamstress posting some homemade dresses to egl. They’re so new and shiny, another year a handful of indie brands simply stop producing things and stop updating their websites. And if you dig through some existing shops, the really old, dodgy releases are still there, still dodgy, and still terrible quality. How am I supposed to speak of any of these brands with awe, when they were barely making anything decent five years ago, and may or may not be around another five years into the future?

They want to be brand? Give them another 50-70 years, and have them step up and do things that really change up lolita. As of right now, all I see is Krad scalping their international customers so that they can be “the next AP” as their master move. And I’m not about to respect them for that, no matter how many tea parties they throw.