Lolita Fashion and the Dreaded Amazon Dress

“I am a Lolita. I do not believe in growing up. No matter how old I get, I shall remain devoted to ruffles and frills.”
― Novala Takemoto, Kamikaze Girls

The main character in Novala Takemoto’s Kamikaze Girls is the perfect example of the Lolita lifestyle. Momoko adorns herself in beautiful things and lives exactly the way she wants to, despite what the people around her say.

The Lolita style is not to be confused with Nabokov’s infamous book Lolita or with Japanese erotica. Lolita is a fashion style that focuses on embracing femininity and dressing for oneself. It functions as a response to the excessive sexualization of women. It is an act of subversion: dressing the way one desires without care for other’s opinions.

You may find members of the Lolita community dunking on Amazon dresses, saying they’re cursed or garbage. Why do they care so much?

Before we can discuss the “forbidden” Amazon dress, let’s define exactly what Lolita fashion is and what the subculture is about.

What is Lolita Fashion?

Lolita is a fashion style (and lifestyle for some) dedicated to dressing for your own enjoyment. There is a focus on cuteness, elegance, modesty, and femininity that does not fit into mainstream interpretations of the above principles.

Originating in Japan, the style takes inspiration from the French Rococo art and fashion, the Victorian era, fairy tales, and children’s literature. The goal: all things cute. Garments are ruffly, patterned, printed, and detailed to an extreme. 

Lolita fashion follows a somewhat standard outfit formula. A bell shaped or A-line skirt supported by petticoats and/or bloomers is the most recognizable element. The shoulders are always covered, usually in a high neckline blouse, and a head accessory is essential. Knee-high tights, bows, berets, parasols, cloaks, and dramatic purses may also be distinctive.

Followers of Lolita fashion often refer to the Gothic and Lolita Bible — which also originated in Japan — for how to assemble a proper Lolita outfit, or coord. Tumblr user 20dollarlolita sums up these principles in 7 steps:

The Seven Aspects of a Lolita Coord

1. Skirt – The skirt is typically knee length and has enough volume to fit a petticoat beneath.
2. Petticoat – This underlay provides the classic, voluminous shape to the look.
3. Not Shoulders – A blouse or cardigan to cover the shoulders. This plays into the modesty principle of the subculture and helps keep the look balanced.
4. Headgear – Bows, berets, ribbons, wigs, or hats bring the details all the way up to the face.
5. Socks – Covering the ankles via tights or knee-high socks contributes to a modest look. It also works to bring interest down to the feet.
6. Wrists – Hands are what connect you to the world, so it is important to incorporate some form of gloves, bracelets, or wrist wear to bring attention to them
7. The rest – Anything else you can add to the outfit to create a bolder, more cohesive look. Eccentric makeup, hairstyles, necklaces, parasols, and nails may fall into this category.

There are many more specific rules to the subculture. For instance, did you know it’s a faux-pas to wear short socks with a long sleeve sweater? Lolita fashion has rigid expectations, though few people follow them religiously.

The history of Lolita fashion: So how did this all start?

Lolita descended from the Dollhouse style, popularized by the Olive Magazine in the mid 80s. The magazine expressed the value of girlhood and incorporated the highly feminine Dollhouse style in addition to more boyish fashion. The feminine style was more popular among readers, and Olive Girls would adorn themselves in ribbons, frills, and long skirts to celebrate their girlhood.

From here, the term Lolita was officially coined in the 90s. The growth of Lolita coincided with that of visual-kei rock bands, which focused on extravagant costumes and stage presence. Visual-kei bands challenged conservative norms and are somewhat comparable to glam-rock bands of the west, with an even larger focus on androgyny. This subgenera worked with Lolita to promote theatrical, maximalist fashion in Japan, which started to spread across the world.

Just before the 2000s, the beginnings of gothic Lolita emerged thanks to visual-kei rock band, Malice Mizner. The guitarist dressed in a Lolita style that was primarily black and contained gothic undertones. Magazines reported on the band, and readers were hooked by the contradiction between the dark gothic elements and the perky, feminine shapes.

In the 21st century, Lolita’s popularity exploded thanks to the Gothic and Lolita Bible, the film adaptation of Kamikaze Girls, and the global internet. Now there are more and more subgenres of Lolita, including country, cyber, and punk styles, which permeated throughout the world.

Why is Lolita so popular? What draws people to the style?

So what is it about Lolita fashion that draws people in? Why is it so popular? Here are a few reasons why people may resonate with the style:

Fantasy

Everyone wants to dress like a princess from a fairy tale. When you look at massive Rococo dresses, you can’t help but imagine yourself in the billowing skirts and frilly sleeves. Lolita is a way of introducing those intricacies into your outfits.

The Fantasy element also connects with the Japanese idea of “kawaii.” Initially an adjective describing things as endearing and cute, it has exploded into its own entity. People want to embrace the idea of kawaii through their outfits.

Femininity

A major aspect of the Lolita fashion and lifestyle is embracing femininity as something to be celebrated. Lolitas understand that we do not grow out of our femininity and feel a need to embrace maidenhood, like the Olive Magazine discussed.

Lolita is dressing in elaborate, girly outfits for oneself, rather than the male gaze. It takes the power of clothes back into the wearer’s hands and allows women to be feminine without sexualization.

“Choosing things with your own personal sense of ‘I like this, I don’t like that’ is the ultimate individualism that sustains the very foundation of Rococo. Rococo, therefore, embodies the spirit of punk rock and anarchism more than any philosophy.”

– Novala Takemoto, Kamikaze Girls

Subversion

Lolita style is a type of subculture: It varies from typical norms of outfits. Like emo or punk, the style may prevent you from getting jobs, fitting in, or getting a boyfriend. But also like emo or punk, that is not the goal.

You are essentially choosing to put your own happiness over socially accepted ways of dress. Momoko, the notorious Lolita character from Kamikaze Girls, delivers this thought-provoking message: “So what if I was deceitful? My happiness was at stake. It’s not wrong to feel good. That’s what Rococo taught me.”

Community

Once people are drawn into the Lolita fashion and lifestyle, they stay for the community it can deliver. Though one may assume the eccentric style of dress and ideas of individualism would lead to loneliness, it actually enables followers of Lolita principles to come together.

Common Lolita gatherings include throwing tea parties, going to parks, taking pictures, and eating at fancy cafes. Not only do they flaunt their outfits, or coords; they flaunt them in front of people who are just as enthusiastic.

The Amazon Dress. What’s the big deal?

All over the internet, you can find distinguished members of the Lolita community dunking on this particular Amazon dress. It looks cute. And it’s a convenient way to dip your toes into Lolita fashion. So why does everyone seem to hate it so much?

It’s stolen art

The Amazon dress is a knockoff from a brand called AndRomeo. Like the megacorporation Amazon is, it saw the demand for Lolita styles and made as many cheap replicas as it possibly could. Because the Amazon website is much more accessible and mainstream in the West, those interested purchased the replica, rather than the original.

This (standard) act of corporate greed took away thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands of dollars in revenue from the creators/designers of the original dress. Like many Lolita brands, AndRomeo runs on limited means and had to temporarily shut down their services to regain their bearings.

The quality of the knockoff is poor

Additionally, when you compare the replica Amazon dress to the original, you can see a clear difference in quality. The dress from AndRomeo has a nicer base fabric and much more detail — each tier of the skirt is adorned with ruffles. Furthermore, the Amazon dress seems to have glued some lace onto the center panel, while the original has two playful curved ruffle decorations. There is also more color depth to the original.

Amazon, Shein, Aliexpress, and dozens of other fast fashion brands have made cheaper copies of hundreds of Lolita dresses. This particular dress became an easy target of animosity among the Lolita community because of the mass amounts of people buying the knockoff. But it also became a symbol of encouraging fast fashion and permitting large companies to steal from smaller companies/designers.

TLDR: The Amazon dress is a cheap knockoff of an authentic Lolita dress that became a symbol of fast fashion and corporate greed.

As the caption of the above video states, Lolita fashion is “armor in battle.” When you dress according to the subculture and follow its ideas about life, you are embracing your own desires over a collective’s. This gentle act of disobedience can be freeing, especially as a young woman struggling with being sexualized.

Lolita fashion is about living for yourself and focusing on the happiness of the only person you have control over: you.