Month Archive for February 2009
NEW CUTE YUMMY TIME BLOG: HELLO KITTY GINGERBREAD HOUSE, SANRIO COOKING CONTEST.
Ruh roh… the Godzilla has spawned. Introducing my second blog, dedicated to cute cooking and kawaii bentos! It’s a community for fellow aficionados of “cute cooking.” I invite you to submit photos of your cute food (either found or handmade) and share your experiences and ideas.
I’m not the only one in my family who engages in “kawaii ryori”. My cousin Amanda Yuen created an adorable gingerbread house for the Sanrio Yummies contest – and was rightfully named one of the 5 finalists! She made the gingerbread herself, and created cute mascots out of icing sugar and food coloring. Click here to read about how Amanda made the gingerbread house… and please VOTE for her so that she can take home the top prize!
Stay tuned for more info about my third book, Cute Yummy Time, to be released this November by Perigee/Penguin Books USA. Til then, you can get your kawaii food fix on my new blog.
Song of the Day #56: BAAL – Vermin
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6% DOKI DOKI AND SPANK: HARAJUKU DECORA AND FAIRY STYLE CLOTHING STORES.
Do fairies exist? In Tokyo, they do – at a theme restaurant called Valley of the Fairies (which you’ll see in my upcoming book) and in two of the cutest clothing shops you’ll ever visit.
Follow the trail of fairy dust and you’ll end up at 6% Doki Doki in Harajuku. In the mid-90s, two young avantgarde types (Sebastian Masudea and Emiko Saito) opened the store – the name is onomatopoeia for the sound of a beating heart – “to add a little bit extra excitement to people’s lives.” 6% Doki Doki’s Decora-cute meets “funny bad taste that old ladies sometimes have” led to success and then disillusionment. Saito moved to San Francisco to become a massage therapist, while Sebastian re-styled the store into the Fairy-kei headquarters that it is today. (Quotes from Japanese Schoolgirl Inferno, p 136-8.)
The teal-haired fairy in the previous post is Tavuchi Sayuri, leader of the Spank! Girls. She opened her first secondhand store (Spank!) in Koenji in 2004, followed by Spank Me! in Shibuya and Chelsea in Nagoya (which will reopen soon in another location). The clothes are a mash-up of Cyndi Lauper, My Little Pony, and Michelle from Full House; as Tavuchi puts it, “A girl with the pink heart is unrivaled!” And the Spank! Girls throw raucous 80s-pop-disco parties, as you can see in the video below.
Spank! and 6% Doki Doki are some of my favorite Tokyo shopping destinations because the staff live and breathe Fairy-kei; their passion and indie mentality are palpable. You can flit over more store photos on Style Arena (here and here).
Song of the Day #55: Spank has a killer YouTube channel; below is a glimpse at the stores and parties.
LA CARMINA
