Beardsley Zoo Meetup

Sweet Lolitas at the Zoo

Barbara,  Ave, Pahl, Danielle, Margot, Jax

Some people in my community ONLY wear sweet style lolita on their EGL fashion journey, so some meetups just do not work for them. However, everyone was on board with dressing as a sweet style lolita when we went to the Beardsley Zoo, the only zoo in Connecticut. It is not a large zoo, but it has a variety of animals in the best cages they could manage for such a small zoo. They have a neat rainforest area with animals and plants of the rainforest, a long meandering path around the park to walk through and gaze at the animals, a fabulous green house exhibit with koi in the center, as well as a central area with a small, but whimsical looking carousel.  We spent maybe 2.5 hours here. It's definitely catered more to young children, but adults can still learn interesting things and see animals not native to our local habitat.  All ticketing is done online as an advance purchase OR you can get a pass from your local library (and show the pass to the entrance kiosk) to get 50% off your tickets for up to 4 people. But if you're a Bridgeport resident, select Saturdays are free entry. 

FYI when you wear sweet lolita and look like a living Victorian Doll, regular people at places tend to go gaga over you. They lose their minds. They ask you to take pictures with their kids. They ask if you work at whatever establishment you are visiting that day, as if someone PAID you to dress up like that on your day off from work. Well here's news to you, YES we do dress up like this, FOR FUN, on the weekends. No we are not getting paid, in fact we pay a lot of money to dress up like this.  So yeah we probably got asked by 6 or 7 parents to take photos with their kids (as a group). 

I mean really, we do look stunning as a group. Barbara and Ave both paired a more simple shirt with sweet fun patterned skirts, and Margot, Jax and I are going for more traditional sweet lolita jsk's. Margot chose pink and lavender while Jax chose yellow pastels to work with as their primary colors, while I chose navy with a hint of pink and blue.  The colors and the themes of our prints all register as sweet style. 

[Wait a second, who's that guy in the middle? Oh, that's Pahl. He's a new addition to my life. He likes to dress up too. He's been collecting costume pieces from different time periods for awhile now (and he's lucky his body hasn't changed size to boot!). You'll be seeing him periodically in the blog too now. Here he is dressed as an early American gentleman, supposedly inspired by the Planters Peanut man. This match to sweet style was particularly challenging, as he has much better costumes for gothic and classic styles already in his wardrobe]. 

 Enough about Pahl, let's talk about my coordinate. The coordinate suggestion of the day was "j-fashion with an animal theme". This was the very first dress I had ever ordered from a Chinese Indie brand. I bought this dress back at the end of May with my first purchase from Devil Inspired. This is the Star Paradise jsk dress from the brand Dreaming and Burning the World. It actually came in 4 different colorways, but the navy seemed the best option with seeing the details on the print. This is definitely one of the less expensive Chinese indie brands. You can tell by the somewhat cheaper lace and the grade of the printed polyester if you get up close. However, from photos it just looks pretty awesome!  I paired it with a polyester shirt I had bought a little later that has wonderfully sewn poof sleeves that always stay in shape (even after going in the washing machine!). The head piece I had to purchase separately from the coordinate, but it does match it in the printed polyester design and lace. I am also wearing wrist cuffs for the first time. [Boy do these things take forever to be made]. But they do really bring an outfit (with short sleeves especially) together! The completely matching tights and shoes were a bit odd. I honestly didn't know that they matched perfectly until I was wearing them in broad daylight. I would have swapped the tights for white over the knee socks (but I did not due to considerations in the outdoor temperature that day). Light rain was predicted and I know I will still get cold despite all the polyester layers. It did in fact rain a bit that day, and I was glad to be wearing tights even though it wasn't my #1 choice. I really liked wearing this dress and look forward to wearing it again!!