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★Anime inspirng fashion★
11/FEB/2009 on air

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Anime is not only what you see on the TV, but nowadays we can find it in fashion trend. Motonari Ono is a fashion designer who graduates from a famous art school in Antwerp, Belgium and is attracting international attention for his unique fashion design, mode x manga & anime.  “It’s a shame that we try to have some distance from anime or manga, blaming that they are for Otaku people in Japan.  Look at how people overseas enjoy Harajuku fashion.  So I dare to mix Otaku culture into the mode fashion.” says Mr. Ono.

When he’s stuck at design works, he goes to the maid cafe in Akiba.

A store that specializes in manga T-shirts named “MANGART BEAMS” in Daikanyama, Tokyo opened 6 months ago.  Speaking of manga T-shirts, that’s not new at all.  We can buy such items somewhere else.  Then how this mangaT differs from others?   They do not just print manga characters as they are.  Instead, they extract the image or impressions from anime, and print such configurations or shapes on the T-shirts, which as you can see is rather artistic than street fashion.

Indeed, comic industry and fashion industry won a great hit like Nekomimi (cat ear) parka, which is famous as Paris Hilton or Avril Lavigne liked to put on.  This is also a good example inspired by manga.

Anime inspired fashion is different from cosplay. Cosplayer wear the same dress as the anime characters, but Anime kawaii (AniKawa) fashion just extract part of the kawaii image from anime and put that essence into the fashion.

In the warehouse they are choosing the clothes inspired by;
Gundam, Suzumiya Haruhi, and GeGeGe no Kitaro.

This Anime Kawaii fashion trend is actually found while watching young people passing by Harajuku. Interviewed people, for example, wear eyeglasses that are inspired by Arare-chan of Dr. Slump or Doronjo of Yatterman. “I just cannot get rid of my favorite anime from my life. This (the way I get dressed) is just an outcome that I expressed my feeling in my fashion.” which sounds convincing…

Anime nail.  Spending 6 hours to put her favorite anime characters on every nail is unbelievable but the bottom line sounds the same. “I just wanna keep things I love with me all the time.”

Taking such items partially into daily life may make us feel good.  It’s more casual and easy for anyone to try, compared with cosplaying.

Plastic rings introduced in the show also get inspired by anime. These rings are made of plastic and originally they are like plastic model so that we can put the parts together to make a ring. It takes only a minute to create a ring from the parts, and 3 patterns are allowed per box.

At a club event in Shibuya, where people enjoy anime songs and cosplaying, which you might think the place were rather Akihabara (Akiba) instead of Shibuya, they offer a good opportunity that Akiba x Shibuya exchange, or Otaku x latest fashion followers exchange.  ”Anyone likes anime; whether it’s a man or a woman, the young or the adult, because it’s the ultimate entertainment! But here in Japan, anime is limited to Otaku people and this negative image just prevents anyone from enjoying anime frankly. Anime basically has power to break down the barrier like that.” says the organizer of the event.

Anime characters are renewed and used in some commercial goods, and after that, the clothes that are worn by the character is in the market for us to buy. Wow, anime industry and fashion industry are collaborating so much these days!