Ebay Haul: Origin Stories

Today's Haul

Cute fashion has been something I've chased after for several years now. After a lifetime of being the homely nerd down the street, it's difficult to break out of my shell and try to become cute after all. But little by little I've been making small steps forward, and I'm finally ready to commit to a casual princess lifestyle!
As I explore beauty and fashion, I've become interested in the capsule wardrobe. Many other fashion bloggers have talked about this concept extensively, and I'll also write about how I see it applying to certain j-fashions in the future once my first real capsule wardrobe is complete. The basic premise of the capsule wardrobe is a 37-item wardrobe good for one season (including shoes but not including accessories). What I love about this idea for someone who is new to fashion like me is that it limits my wardrobe to a number which is manageable, and forces me to be creative with what pieces I choose to add to my collection. My choices are small enough that I can compare each piece to the rest of the wardrobe and easily identify which pieces fit to create a cohesive style and which pieces stand out. This is a skill that I want to improve, and I hope that building capsule wardrobes will help me with this goal.

Enough talk, onto my purchases! I did some research into the himekaji (literally casual princess) style and tried to determine what would comprise a basic himekaji wardrobe. After collecting all of my cute frilly, lacey, and floral clothing, I decided that I'm really lacking in dresses, skirts, and cute blouses, and also that most of my T-shirts are not really appropriate for this fashion. I did some window shopping and found some cute items to fill in the gaps in what I already owned, and determined what I will buy and what I will make myself. Of course, skirts mostly fall into the second category! I thought I would buy a lot of blouses, but I actually couldn't find many offbrand blouses which were appropriate for the style, so I'll be modifying some thrifted blouses instead. After all was said and done, these were the 8 items that I settled on for my first summer himekaji haul.

Item 1: The Dress

Pink Liz Lisa JSK

This is the purchase I was most excited about, and also almost half the cost of my total purchase on its own! ... Don't freak out guys, it was under $30, I'm just a poor college student. I knew I wanted a cute dress that I could dress down and wear casually or dress up and wear in a more dressy coord. I actually found a dress similar to this at a thrift store in earth tones which I love and wear all the time, so when I saw this dress I was instantly in love with it!

On top of being excited about the style, it's a Liz Lisa piece and also the very first brand item that I have purchased. Due to the low price, I was worried about the authenticity of this dress. However, the eBay seller was very quick in responding to my inquiries with a photo of the Liz Lisa tag. (Perhaps it's so cheap because it's fallen out of style? Oh well, I love it anyway!) My earth tones dress is very cute, but the fabric is quite thin and the skirt isn't quite full enough so it hangs to my legs a bit awkwardly sometimes. I'm excited to receive this dress to see the quality of brand!

This maybe doesn't scream himekaji in particular, but I think it still fits the style loosely. I'm expecting to wear this dress more for casual daily wear, but I bet with the right blouse and accessories it could be dressed up to something really resembling himekaji.

Item 2: The T-Shirt

Offbrand Watercolor Strawberry T-Shirt

Although blouses lend themselves more properly to himekaji, since I'm assembling this wardrobe for daily use, I know I'll get sick of wearing blouses every day if I don't give myself some variety. Maybe some days I'll want to wear a T-shirt, but still want to feel like a princess on her day off when I go out. I already have this Jiji T-shirt, which despite being a men's shirt is very soft and comfortable, and would be easy to pair with a cute skirt for a lazy day coord, but I wanted to give myself a bit more T-shirt variety. This shirt which you can find on eBay looked just dreamy enough to work with my closet, plus I thought the strawberry motif could work in a summer wardrobe anyway. 

This is still probably the biggest risk purchase I made, since I have no idea how the fit will be on it. The listing is marked as plus-size, but also one size fits most. I've also never bought a batwing T-shirt before. But, it was quite cheap and even if it doesn't quite fit out of the package, I can probably salvage it under the sewing machine.

Item 3: The Lace Summer Cardigan

Offbrand Lace Summer cardigan

I'm a sweater kind of girl. When I go outside without anything covering my shoulders, I feel absolutely naked. Unfortunately for me, I also live in southern California, and it can't stay winter all year long. I've been wanting to get something thin and light like this. My hope is that I can wear it and feel like I'm wearing a sweater even when it's boiling hot outside.

I was a bit worried about how this would fit in with a himekaji vibe, since to me it has more of an almost cult party kei look to it... but I'll see if I can coordinate it so it doesn't look too out of place.

You can find the listing for this cardigan here.

Items 4, 5 & 6: Undergarments

Offbrand Lace Safety Shorts and socks

Oh man I am so ready for these shorts to suck. With shipping they were a grand total of $4 and I am not expecting it to be pretty. But for so cheap, I couldn't resist holding out hope that they might be decent. I've been wanting a pair of these since they first became popular. I think they're so cute and would look great poking out under a short skirt.

And of course, what would a himekaji wardrobe be without frilled socks? The pink ones were listed as "light purple" so we'll see if they actually end up being like in the picture... but they were also extremely cheap so it's not a big deal if it's not the right socks. I might find a use for purple frill socks in the future anyway.

Items 7 & 8: Jewelry

Jewelry was never something I've ever really been able to get the hang of. I've managed to collect a couple of cute necklaces, but I actually have zero bracelets, save for one plastic bead bracelet a friend made for me a long time ago (which is decidedly too bubblegum pink for the muted pinks, peaches, and creams I'm going for in this capsule wardrobe) so I found both of these on eBay for under $1 each. I like the bow motif and I think the fake pearls will create a cute and elegant appeal. Their listings can be found here and here. 

Overall, my wardrobe still has a lot of work to be done. Since this is going to be meant for daily wear, I wanted to give myself a lot of freedom in how closely I want to follow the style from day to day. I hope that once I add some cute blouses and skirts this collection will start to look more like himekaji. Including items I already owned, the items I just bought, and items which I have plans to make myself, I have about 31 items which I'm pretty sure about. I need to decide on 2-4 more pairs of shoes, which leaves somewhere between 2 and 4 items left as wild cards (and of course, the capsule wardrobe is only a guideline, so if I break 37 by a couple of items that's ok too). I want to get a solid everyday wardrobe going first, and for my final couple of items I'll probably pick a couple of more distinctly himekaji dresses to top off this summer's wardrobe once I've learned a bit more about the style.

I'm excited to learn more about himekaji and dive into a cuter and more fashionable lifestyle!