Wednesday 29 June 2011

Closet Feature: Red Yukata & Black Obi

Red & Black yukata


So.... I've finally decided to get rid of this red yukata ^^; I've worn it a few times, so while it's clean and stain-free, it's not in the best condition... But the material is softer now, compared to when I first received it!

I tossed this plain black obi with the yukata (the reverse side of the obi is bright red) because I got it with one of the yukata sets I bought for a godsister and there was no way I was going to let one of my godsisters wear such an ugly thing ^^;;;

I kind of think that if the obi was folded a little in the front to show off a bit of red, it'd look pretty nice with this yukata :)


Sunday 26 June 2011

Outfit Snap: Navy Blue Yukata & Seafoam Green Obi

After working on my blog for a while and surrounding myself with kimono for practically the whole weekend, I had the urge to either buy more kimono or have a dress-up session to distract myself from shopping.

So..... I had a dress-up session! ^_^

I wanted to just throw on something easy, but I had a very specific obi in mind to wear today, so I grabbed both the obi and another yukata that was just lying around.

Here is the result! ^_^

(Please don't mind that the photos are really low quality! My mum is holding my camera for her business trips so I had to make-do with my phone)

Navy Yukata & Seafoam Obi


I'm carrying the umbrella because.... Well ^^; It matched the colour scheme and it was just there. It's actually an RM5 bit of nonsense that I bought from Daisou just because it was cheap and cute.

Navy Yukata & Seafoam Obi


I really like that both the yukata and obi have a rose theme :) I also kind of like that the pearls on the obi are a little similar to the false shibori dots on the yukata.

Navy Yukata & Seafoam Obi


Today's obi musubi was chosen because I was actually experimenting with wearing yukata without any padding and I needed something large that will hide the lower back area of my yukata. I did have to stuff a whole towel underneath the obi to keep the musubi perky, but a few clever folds and some manipulation of how the obi falls and you'd never notice :)

On wearing yukata without padding: I have to say that it does do wonders for managing the heat! I can see now why people say that yukata are cooling to wear. I had to tie my yukata a little looser than usual so that the himo don't cut into my body, but it just makes for a more comfortable kitsuke.

I have to keep practicing this to improve my kitsuke without padding! XD


Closet Feature: Black Yukata & Hot Pink Obi

I was taking pics of some yukata I'm selling to a friend of a friend, and thought I'd share the pics here one at a time.

Here is the first of the 8 outfits I've put together:

Photobucket

(Please don't mind the low quality photo - I had to use my phone's camera as my mum is holding my camera hostage at the moment ^^;)

Both the yukata and obi are brand new.

I'm not really looking for critique on coordination - I paired the yukata and obi based on what matched best together from the pile I wanted to get rid of.

I just kind of wondered how much you'd pay for a set like this? I'm selling this to her at cost price because she's a friend's friend, but I was kind of curious to know how much most people (especially Malaysians!) would be willing to pay for this sort of thing.

Good night!


Saturday 25 June 2011

Blog Layout (again!)

Haha, seems like I went overboard with the restructuring... I had honestly only meant to edit the side bar a little, but then I started exploring a little more when I was bored and next thing you know, I was adding all sorts of things to my blog ^^;

The pages at the top are still incomplete (I still have to add one for Kimono Knowledge and another for Know-How) but at least the template is there for me to start off with. I'm also looking into changing the font for my pages... That one will take longer in coming because it's quite far down my priority list.

For now, I'm just happy with cleaning up my sidebar and adding a signature and a LinkWithin widget :) I've also added a new Contact Me form that's pretty easy to use, but I've left the link to the old one just in case it fails or something.

Of course, now my blog takes pretty long to upload so I may end up removing LinkWithin and leaving my Pages font as it is.

Let me know of any complaints? ^_^

Edited to add: Okay, so it was getting a little too slow so I removed the Search bar and LinkWithin. The signature does make it slower, but I really like it... :/


Wednesday 22 June 2011

Blog Restructuring

My T&T post on kimono fit is moving on really slowly (can’t tell you how many times I’ve rewritten the thing only to delete it all and start over again ^^;) so I thought I’d just move on and post about something else instead.

I got bored over the weekend and did up a table of post ideas – and I have to say that I have a lot of ideas on what to post, and no idea on where to start! So I figured reorganizing everything so that my blog is more structured would be a great place to begin with, and it’ll certainly help me see what areas I ought to work on first.

As such, I’m now in the middle of reorganizing my blog – adding new tags, editing titles, etc. I’m also updating my sidebar to reflect some of the changes.... Although I'll have to continually update my Tips & Tricks series and the upcoming Kimono Knowledge series as I write and post them, which will eventually happen (in like maybe ten years or so, at the rate I’m going XD;)

Anyway! I’m looking forward to having a more organized blog XD; Maybe it’ll inspire me to write more or something as well haha.

Ta~!


Thursday 9 June 2011

Event Announcement: 35th Bon Odori in Shah Alam, Malaysia

Just another quick post.

The Embassy of Japan in Malaysia announced the official date for the 35th Bon Odori in Shah Alam, Malaysia yesterday:

Date : Saturday, 16th July 2011

Time : 5pm - 9.15pm

Venue : Kompleks Sukan Negara (Former Panasonic Sports Complex)

Free shuttle bus : from KTM Shah Alam Station (Section 19) to Kompleks Sukan Negara and vice versa from 4pm to 11pm

Programme:
5pm - Gates open
7pm - Opening
9.15pm - Closing Address

Here's a link to the announcement page on the Embassy's website:
http://www.my.emb-japan.go.jp/English/JIS/culturalevents/bon11/070611.html

And a link to the leaflet for the 35th Bon Odori in Malaysia:
http://www.my.emb-japan.go.jp/English/JIS/culturalevents/bon11/35thbonodori_new.pdf

I most likely will not be going for this year's Bon Odori - last year was crowded enough, thanks very much! I'll probably still dress up that night though, just for the fun of it :)

Goodnight!


Wednesday 8 June 2011

Event Announcement: Tokyo Street opening in Pavilion Kuala Lumpur (July 2011)

This is a little bit of a late post, considering that this was actually officially announced two weeks ago, but Pavilion Kuala Lumpur will be opening Tokyo Street in July 2011!

According to various news sources and the Pavilion KL website, this street, located on the 6th floor of Pavilion, is inspired by Asakusa, Ginza and Shibuya and will host a variety of shops offering Japanese F&B, retail, beauty products and more.

So far, I have spotted a mochi shop, a proper green tea shop, an ice cream shop, a really nice cafe, a Daiso.... well, alot of things that I'm looking forward to, really!

If you would like to see more, the official Pavilion KL webpage for Tokyo Street is here:
http://www.pavilion-kl.com/content/precint.php?precint=tokyo_street

*squees in excitement* July can't come any faster!


Sunday 5 June 2011

Coordination Comments: Yellow Snowflake Komon & Purple Obi

For the past few months, I've been complaining to a friend that I haven't been blogging much because I never seem to find time to dress up in kimono. She suggested that since I have so many pieces that I don't have the chance to wear, why don't I just post pics and comments on coordinates instead?

Well today, I'm finally listening to her advice! I tend to prefer not to post coordinates before I wear them as I like to wear something completely new each time I dress up in kimono, but well... desperate times call for desperate measures, I guess XD;

Here is today's coordinate!

Yellow Komon & Purple Obi Coordinate


As you can see, I'm still on my yellow phase XD

This here is another yellow hitoe komon that I got from Shinei's sales sometime last year. I know, I know, I already had one yellow hitoe komon.... But yellow is such a cute colour, and I couldn't resist the snowflakes!

One thing I love about hitoe is that it can be worn with either summer or spring/autumn/winter accessories, depending on the look you are going for. Since I wore summer accessories last week, I thought I'd go for a warmer look for this coordinate.

I wanted to give myself a bit of a challenge today and pair this kimono with a more striking obi. Usually I would just follow a colour scheme that would match the tone of the kimono - in this case, it would be dusty pink, browns and white. However, I just couldn't shake the idea of wearing purple and yellow together, so I brought out my favourite purple obi.

Close-up of the colours:
Yellow Komon & Purple Obi Coordinate


I matched it with a pale green obijime to give it a bit more of a refreshing feel, and a green han'eri with embroidered pink flowers to bring out more of the green and highlight a little of the pink.

I was at a bit of a loss when it came to the obiage, but my friend had given me this yellow obiage that was perfect - if I fold it correctly, it would have little squares of purple, green and pink showing!

The obiage does seem to blend into the kimono abit, but I wanted both the kimono and the obi to be the main focus of the outfit. A pink obiage (or even a coral one to match the flower in the obi) would've been one too many colours in this outfit and would've made the obi and its accessories the main focus, with the kimono just fading behind as a background to the striking combination.

I forgot to add tabi and zori to the picture, but I think I'd probably have worn white tabi (maybe I can embroider some to have green leaves or something?) and yellow zori. If I had green or purple zori, I'd definitely wear them though!

I'm pretty happy with the formality of this outfit. It's something that I'd probably wear out for lunch at a nice restaurant in a mall, or something that I'd go to watch a movie or musical or concert... Maybe even a house party if I'm brave enough! It's exactly the sort of places and events I'd wear kimono to, which means this outfit is perfectly wearable for me :)

How do you like this outfit? What would you change about it if the kimono and obi had to stay the same?