Japan 2020 Highlights: Tansuya

A somewhat unexpected highlight of the Japan trip was shopping at Tansuya, a secondhand kimono chain. It started while we were in Tokyo when we went to the branch at Nippori, the fabric district, since I had read that they had lots of cheap, damaged or worn kimonos for sale very cheap. Indeed they did, and we actually visited this shop twice.

There was also one in Shinjuku Station, which we did not visit, since we thought only the Nippori store had the cheap kimonos. We were wrong...

...because we went to Kyoto, and in the mall right near our hotel we discovered another Tansuya! So we added more kimono and obi and other pretty things to our purchases.

And then we moved onto Hiroshima, and I just happened to be wandering around on my own while James got a much needed massage when I spotted, you guessed it, another Tansuya! If memory serves me right, this is where I bought the brown haori.

To make things even more ridiculous when we went to a particular Book Off in Osaka we passed a Tansuya on the way, where James found the most stunning furisode and we bought way too many obijime.

We thought it was hilarious that we'd stumbled into a Tansuya every city we travelled too. But it did get a bit excessive when we walked past another one in Namba Station on our way to transfer to the airport train ^__^

I never thought we'd own such lovely things as the kimonos we bought at Tansuya. As we were on a budget we only shopped their cheapest items, most of which are damaged in some way. But the quality of Japanese secondhand items hold true even with kimono - most of the damage is tiny snags or stains, or at worst, yellowed lining. The garments and still whole and still amazingly beautiful.

There was also a lot to admire in these stores, like the vegetable patterned kimono above! James even found a gorgeous kimono raincoat thing, which is really cool and not what we thought we'd be getting at a kimono shop. And he got himself a very attractive red and black haori, which he look amazing in!

As you'll have seen in my coord posts, I have been experimenting with wa lolita, and James has started using some kimonos in his photoshoots. We still need to acquire the proper undergarments and such if we want to dress me or models properly, but for now it's just been great fun to have bought such beautiful clothes and be able to wear them in non-traditional ways.