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Monday 7 February 2022

Prints I would love to see

A topic that you see from time to time on lolita blogs is prints the writer would love to see done. It's something I rarely think about, but I'm feeling the urge to blog a bit more so why not give it a try myself? 

A camellia print that focuses on the flower, and that isn’t distinctly wa-lolita. I know Meta has included camellias in many of their wa-lolita series (including the one I own!) but honestly I would love to see Innocent World or BTSSB do this. My dad used to have beautiful Chinese watercolour style paintings of camellias in his house and I’d love to see something like that as a print. Not cartoony, simplified camellias but lovely delicate ones.

Sourced from the Victoria and Albert Museum website.

A watercolour style kitten print with relatively realistic kittens playing together. I love cats, but don’t tend to love to many cat prints – the cats often look cartoony or kind of uncanny, or it’s something that I like but wouldn’t wear. But something where the illustration is a bit Beatrix Potter is style would be gorgeous, perhaps in soft muted pastel colourways. This would totally be an Innocent World thing (I know they’ve done a print like this – Kitten Embroidery, I believe – but those kittens were a bit on the creepy side for me!) or I feel like it could be done really nicely by an indie brand.

Cute...but I want it less deranged looking.

A Celtic knotwork print, which I feel would be done best by Meta or Alice and the Pirates if it was done by one of the big brands because I wouldn’t want it done in a particularly gothic way (though if it was gothic, Atelier Pierrot might do a great job of it). Something classic, maybe with vines twining around the knotwork shapes, would be gorgeous, especially if it kept to earthier colourways and had a slight historical influence to the cuts as well. This could so easily be super tacky though, but I think if done well it would be stunning.

Doesn't have to be crosses, but I just liked this shot from Pixabay.

A Little House on the Prairie print is something else that I think would be really lovely. I would want this to be a print like how brands do classical painting prints – it wraps all the way around the skirt, or perhaps duplicated front and back. There would be the little wooden house in an endless field of grass and flowers, with three little girls playing nearby. The different colourways could be indicative of different times of day, kind of like BTSSB has done with some of their landscape style prints. I’d love to see Baby do this, actually, but only if they kept the cuts retrained and somewhat Victorian – the image would not suit an elegant frilly and lacy affair.

One of Garth Williams' gorgeous illustrations

A print of a landscape of autumn trees, particularly maple trees, or an all-over pattern of falling leaves. Totally a Meta thing, I think, but it would be gorgeous if Baby did this. I would so wear this, and love it forever. Autumn trees are just so gorgeous and the rich colours I think would really suit lolita quite well.

Okay, so you can't see it too well, but basically it's this kimono pattern that I want.

Overall, I think I’d just mostly love to see more plant, flower and landscape prints in a detailed and classic way. Even though I don’t garden much, I am a plant lover, and there’s just so much natural beauty all around that it would be great to see lolita brands branch out more in that direction.

Are there any particular things you’d like to see as a lolita print?

4 comments:

  1. The Celtic cross print idea made me think of The Book of Kells print and now I want something like that. Generally I feel like recently we've had lots of great sweet and gothic prints, but classic ones have been falling behind a bit, either getting a bit too sweet or a bit too safe and samey. Not that I expect classic brands to experiment much, but there is so much that could be done with florals alone! And you're right, for a country that loves its seasons as much as Japan, we've not had anything autumnal and nature-based.

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    1. You know what, I hadn't thought of it in those terms but you're completely right - there does seem to be a dearth of interesting classic prints at the moment. Fingers crossed we'll have a classic resurgence soon.

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  2. I would absolutely love to see a print with autumn trees and falling leaves!

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    1. It seems to be a popular idea so fingers crossed it happens sometime!

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