Old but Good

You've worn your favorite kimono every spring for so many years that its sleeves have started to tatter. You know it makes you look somehow like a rōnin but you just can't stop wearing it. CHATNOIR Catnap has released two such kimonos. TP here to get them!

Beautiful And Delicious

When you think about spring in Japan, it's also time to go to the mountain and pick up mountain vegetables (sansai). Bamboo shoots is one of these. The bamboo, beautiful and delicious. Abamama Hax has prepared a pack for you to enjoy seeing both of them in your garden. You can find it in her store.

Sakura

Spring is here and the flowering of cherry blossoms has already begun in southern Japan! For the occasion, Toya Watanabe has released sakura trees at her store in Kodama no Ki. They come in four sizes (mostly sold separately), and you can choose between having a tree with falling a petals effect that you can turn on or off with a click, or one that turns the effect on and animates you when you sit on it. I could have a look at them and I can tell you that the big tree that animates you is really sweet to see! Oh, by the way. If you want to see what the medium-sized tree looks like, walk a few steps north of Toya's shop. It'll be blooming there until the end of April!

Folding screens

CHATNOIR Catnap has two new mod/copy folding screens for sale in her shop. The paintings are those that were previously featured on two kimonos, except now you can contemplate them better :o)

Macabre

Macabre. A quality of certain artistic or literary works, characterized by a grim or ghastly atmosphere. In these works, there is an emphasis on the details and symbols of death.

Macabre was an album and era of Japanese visual kei band Dir en Grey. There were many different outfits worn and many variatios of them but Kiba Tachikawa chose to make Die's most famous leather body suit. He says that the reason for this choice was for Hentai Katayama, the co-owner of Kanzen ni Jrock. His first experience with visual kei was Die in this very outfit.

If you are unfamiliar with Dir en Grey or that particular outfit, here are Kiba's references :

image one | image two | image three

Monsters Garage

If you ever meet Kennt Kidd, he'll probably have the appearance of one of his seven products that make up a nice line of Ultraman avatars. Ultraman, the number one Japanese super-hero.

But Kennt has also thought about those of you who get to like the villains better. You can now cosplay as one of these funky retro monsters that rampage, with laser beams, unrealistic scale models of Japanese cities. And yes, most of these products have special effects included :o)

The shop is right here.