Harajuku Cosplay Convention

[boo]

i was going to add this to the manga drawing thread but, i thought that some of the costumes maybe better suited to a gentlemans club, rather than the more public areas of the board.

so ok, if anyone is into japanese anime, then the pictures in the collage below are all quite famous characters. you will know most of them, especially on the middle line.

they were taken in the streets and parks at the annual harajuku cosplay convention last year.

young girls from all across japan go to great lengths to emulate the characters in japanese animation.

most of the costumes are hand made by the girls themselves, with a little help from the family i guess too.

every year the media of japan mass to the tokyo suburb, as anime, comic and video game fans (otaku) line the parks and streets.

as for it's origin. as far back as the 1920's, harajuku has been a bit of an extroverted area of city.

of course, akihabara, the home of AKB48 : ), is the most popular and easiest way to meet, and speak with cosplayers, as they line loads of the streets of the centre of the techno world, to the north east of central tokyo.

hey, if you are into gaming, i most definitely recommend getting ones arse over to akihabara for the day at some point in your life time.

anyway, yes, akihabara is the most common area to find cosplayers.

but this is a convention. it is completely different to the cosplayers in akihabara.

there is a prize to be won.

so legend has it, young japanese girls would dance in harajuku to attract the attentions of the local boys.

i was speaking to my mates grandmother aboot this very thing this morning before work. makes proper japanese tea : )

she was saying that she remembers when she was in her early 20's, dancing in the streets of harajuku.

but if you have ever seen japanese ladies dancing in a kimono, you to have felt the snake in the basket charms of the pipe player.

as fashion changed, new clothes started to appear, and so did anime.

as the anime culture became more fashionable around the mid 80's, so too did the ideas of past, in dressing for the performances in this hip part of town.

video games, comics and anime continued to grow, and so too it's fan base. it is massive.

you are talking aboot around the figures of the entire population of england.

anime became more popular, the harajuku girls, i guess saw this as a way to attract the 'modern' young boys (otaku) in copying the characters in the comics.

this trade is said to have broken out in both france and italy recently but for me, cosplay girls have to be from japan.

[Bogota Yid]

Me likes!!! Can you make the pics bigger though?
Ive been to Harajuku a couple of times, proper weird! Kind of like Camden in London multiplied by a thousand

[Sraew]

I got no idea what you're on about, but I'd smash everyone of those women.