Greetings and Salutations.
I am a lifestyle and daily Lolita. I dabble a little bit in all the styles and colors Lolita comes in, probably because I’ve seen so many trends come and go in the fashion.
Aside from trends, I’ve watched blogs, websites, brands and even people come and go over the years. The latest victim of time that I have noticed is photos. Lolita history. Gone. Wiped out. Photobucket, tinypic, free photo hosting sites that we use to rely on in the early years of the internet are wiping out years of old photos. EGL on Livejournal use to be the go-to place for sharing photos and excitement with other fans of Lolita around the world. And don’t come at me for the use of the word fan. Back then, most people had to rely on diy, handmade, thrifted and modified clothing unless you were fortunate enough to know someone in Japan, or were able to go to Japan yourself for all your shopping needs. There were no shopping services. Hardly any good western indie brands. You can’t imagine how different it was back then compared to now. But at the time I was completely enamored and smitten by the world of Lolita.
But with our rich history being carelessly deleted, I thought it might be fun to go back to this day, 15 years ago and revisit what it was like so many years ago when I first joined. Maybe I’ll be lucky and I can snag a few photos before they are all gone.
EGL: September 16, 2019
The first post I find is from an EGL/EGA themed tea party that took place in Brooklyn, New York. Unfortunately many photos are gone and the few that remain are branded by that ghastly Photobucket watermark. But, at lease you can still see the image. A tiny peak into American Lolita Fashion circles 15 years ago.
Unfortunately due to the many missing photos, I had to skip many of the posts of the day. I did, however, find one person requesting scans of GLB recipes so that they may translate them for the community. This photo is supposedly from vol 3, and is referred to as Vampire Kiss. The general consensus is that it looks to be made of jello with whole blueberries and topped with whip cream.
One thing I did notice in surprising amounts is the use of the abbreviation "loli" (or rori, to imitate the pronunciation of the Japanese) instead of lolita. I imagine it was so popular due to the use of ゴスロリ (gosurori) in media and magazines to describe the style. While we did have our occasional creeps back in the day, you weren't constantly bombarded by pictures of girls with pacifies and diapers like we are today. The attack of ageplayers had not yet commenced, hence while now if I heard someone use the word "loli" I would probably cringe so hard a little part of my soul would die, back then it was pretty normal. Christ, I can even remember little teenage me often using the term. But by 2010 or so, the threat of sissys, ageplayers and loli-con pedos were becoming so rampant, most people dropped the term to distance themselves from "that kind of lolita."
All in all, it was a lot of fun going back through the posts from exactly 15 years ago. I really miss having a world-wide community in one page. Where posts were arranged by date, not by popularity or activity such as whatever weird algorithms Facebook and Instagram has adopted. I'd like to go back through the older posts again soon, before all the old photos are gone forever.
I am a lifestyle and daily Lolita. I dabble a little bit in all the styles and colors Lolita comes in, probably because I’ve seen so many trends come and go in the fashion.
Aside from trends, I’ve watched blogs, websites, brands and even people come and go over the years. The latest victim of time that I have noticed is photos. Lolita history. Gone. Wiped out. Photobucket, tinypic, free photo hosting sites that we use to rely on in the early years of the internet are wiping out years of old photos. EGL on Livejournal use to be the go-to place for sharing photos and excitement with other fans of Lolita around the world. And don’t come at me for the use of the word fan. Back then, most people had to rely on diy, handmade, thrifted and modified clothing unless you were fortunate enough to know someone in Japan, or were able to go to Japan yourself for all your shopping needs. There were no shopping services. Hardly any good western indie brands. You can’t imagine how different it was back then compared to now. But at the time I was completely enamored and smitten by the world of Lolita.
But with our rich history being carelessly deleted, I thought it might be fun to go back to this day, 15 years ago and revisit what it was like so many years ago when I first joined. Maybe I’ll be lucky and I can snag a few photos before they are all gone.
What EGL looked like for the past few years compared to now. This is the final layout of EGL as of September 2019.
EGL: September 16, 2019
The first post I find is from an EGL/EGA themed tea party that took place in Brooklyn, New York. Unfortunately many photos are gone and the few that remain are branded by that ghastly Photobucket watermark. But, at lease you can still see the image. A tiny peak into American Lolita Fashion circles 15 years ago.
One individual offered the recipe of a cocktail called Vampire's Kiss which imitates the look of blood: Cranberry Juice, Vodka, Grenadine and Chamborde/Raspberry Liquor.
I actually have a large collection of GLBs, so maybe one day I'll make some time to go back and try out these early recipes myself!
One thing I did notice in surprising amounts is the use of the abbreviation "loli" (or rori, to imitate the pronunciation of the Japanese) instead of lolita. I imagine it was so popular due to the use of ゴスロリ (gosurori) in media and magazines to describe the style. While we did have our occasional creeps back in the day, you weren't constantly bombarded by pictures of girls with pacifies and diapers like we are today. The attack of ageplayers had not yet commenced, hence while now if I heard someone use the word "loli" I would probably cringe so hard a little part of my soul would die, back then it was pretty normal. Christ, I can even remember little teenage me often using the term. But by 2010 or so, the threat of sissys, ageplayers and loli-con pedos were becoming so rampant, most people dropped the term to distance themselves from "that kind of lolita."
All in all, it was a lot of fun going back through the posts from exactly 15 years ago. I really miss having a world-wide community in one page. Where posts were arranged by date, not by popularity or activity such as whatever weird algorithms Facebook and Instagram has adopted. I'd like to go back through the older posts again soon, before all the old photos are gone forever.
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