ネイルアート

We looked at Japanese nail art a short while ago and were so impressed we fingered our photographer to go out and find us a few more examples of elaborately manicured hands.



Japanese nail art has taken off on the east and west coasts of North America with a number of salons in New York, Vancouver and Los Angeles offering Japanese style manicures and nail chips.



And oh yes, you can still hold chopsticks, drink and giggle into your cell phone wearing these.



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ネイルアート

Nail art has become a big fashion item for Japanese women (and some men) over the last few years.



Elaborately painted and sculptured nails complete with flowery rhinestones and lacy stick-ons (known as nail chips) are popular with the teenagers in Shibuya, at graduation ceremonies and weddings.

The trend is similar to the colorful decoration of cell phones known as decoden and the impulse to decorate movement in traditional Japanese art - kazari.

Numerous nail art salons can be found in Tokyo and other big Japanese cities.

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ゴシックロリータ（ゴスロリ）

"Gothic Lolita" is a fashion style, born in Japan, that blends the dark, brooding gothic and the light, frilly Lolita looks.

To see is to believe.

In other countries, the gothic look is an expression of alienation, teen anger, even anarchy. Piercing and aggressive tattoing are often part of the package.

Lolita is of course the young woman and title of the great Vladimir Nabokov novel. In Japan, she has been appropriated in the "Lolita complex" (rori-con). This is the phenomenon describing Japanese men who are obsessed with very young--very young--girls.

In terms of fashion, Lolita refers to hyper-cute girls in frilly pink and white outfits.

Young Japanese women have melded these different forms of alienation and created a bizarre sub-category fashion look. In highly detailed outfits, complete in many cases with Little Bo Peep umbrellas, they parade in groups in city centers.

Disclaimer: The author is not an expert on gothic, Lolita, or gothic Lolita fashion. We welcome comments and corrections from our readers.

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秋のファション：足と入れ墨

On a recent trip to Tokyo, I wandered around Shinjuku, Daikanyama, and the Harajuku/Omotesando areas and was struck by many things.

One surprise for someone coming up from Kyoto was the number of tattoos, especially on women. In Kansai, tattoos are still a bit rare. Mobsters, of course, and the occasional college student or artist have tattoos.

In Tokyo, however, tattoos were everywhere.

And on all parts of the body.

We saw countless tattoos high up on the thigh just barely visible under a skirt or hot pants, just next to cleavage, on the back of the neck, the side of the ankle, the shoulder blade, etc.

The woman with the Mickey Mouse tattoo--it's real--on her calf was waiting for a train at Shibuya Station. Her exposed shoulders featured elaborate dragons.

One sign that tattoos may even be a bit passe was that we spied a woman, in her late 20s, who had the telltale scars on her left arm of tattoo removal. She was feeding a baby in an Italian coffee shop.

Another, more attractive, surprise were leggings.

Women of all ages sported all sorts of leggings.

The women pictured at left was in her early- to mid-40s, very attractive, and made quite an impression with her brilliantly colored and patterned leggings. She is strolling along Omotesando on a recent Saturday.

Few if any openly stared at her as she paraded along the tree-lined street thronged with tourists and locals.

The clack-clack of her heels punctuated the colors as they shifted along her legs while she walked.



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