JAPANESE DECORATED CELL PHONES HOW-TO TUTORIAL. DIY LAPTOP DECORATIONS, CUTE MOBILE CHARMS & STRAPS, SAMSUNG FOREVER TOUCH SCREEN PHONE.
My cell phone had a cracked screen and dented case from the zillion times I dropped it. Time for a replacement. I’m too poor for a Blackberry or iPhone (the plans are so expensive), but I’m very pleased with my new Samsung Forever. Texting-wise, the touch screen is a vast improvement.
A new mobile means… time to customize! First, I peeled away the protective plastic covers and turned OFF the keytone sounds (two of my pet peeves). Then I bought a new ringtone — Combichrist’s All Pain Is Gone — because I like industrial, and for the laugh factor (when someone calls, the phone screams, “This is the dayy, the dayy I dieeeee! Alll painn is gonnnnne!”). Next, I took a photo of my squishy Scottish Fold cat and set it as the wallpaper.
The best part: decorating the backside. I looked at blinged-out Japanese cell phones for inspiration (above). However, I didn’t want anything too three-dimensional, such as a plush teddy bear or giant strawberry — it would surely come off. And I didn’t want to buy new craft materials.
So I covered my mobile with Alice in Wonderland stickers and gems from Daiso and Tokyu Hands. I coated the bare areas with glitter nail polish, taking care to avoid the camera and stay within the lines. Finally, I painted several top coats with clear nail polish, to make sure the stickers adhered. (Tip: open the windows. How I was woozy from the fumes!)
You may remember my laptop and notebook decoration tutorials. (Click here to refresh your memory.)
My new laptop runs circles around the old one, but it wasn’t sufficiently heavy metal. While at Magic clothing tradeshow in Vegas, I picked up free stickers from Goth and alternative clothing brands. I stuck them on my laptop lid; ta-da, J-rock computer. (Isn’t Basil Farrow’s mouse toy scary? It looks so real.)
You can decorate your Nintendo DS case, hair clips, cell phone straps… anything in your possession! (Check out the Fancy Pocket examples above.) All you need are basic kawaii/decora items such as stickers, charms, nail polish, gems, beads, glitter… and your imagination.
Have you tried decorating your laptop or cell phone? Do you have a photo of your pet as your mobile’s wallpaper?
PS: come check out my latest CNNGo articles…
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† 10 moments of pure Asian geek brilliance. Rickshaw robots and otaku choreographed dancing changed the world. Or didn’t.
Song of the Day #331: Combichrist – All Pain Is Gone (What is your current ringtone?)
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LA CARMINA
87 Comments
My pet is still my mobile’s wallpaper, even though she died almost 3 years ago. She was the best dog. <3
My mobile only has straps, but I want to buy some deco den gear sometime and make it all crazy. I'm sure you can get the three dimensional stuff stick with enough GLUE 8D
awww I’m so sorry you lost your beloved pet :-(
<3 Aww your dog sounds the sweetest. If you end up decora-ing your phone, let me know how it goes! Super glue!
My pet is still my mobile's wallpaper, even though she died almost 3 years ago. She was the best dog. <3
My mobile only has straps, but I want to buy some deco den gear sometime and make it all crazy. I'm sure you can get the three dimensional stuff stick with enough GLUE 8D
Oh, come on, Carmina. A plush teddy bear surrounded by plastic pastries screaming, “This is the dayy, the dayy I dieeeee! Alll painn is gonnnnne!” would be worth it.
(One of my favorite Combichrist tracks, by the way. Although “This Shit Will Fuck You Up” might have been even more amusing for a ringtone coming from a Japanified phone… “How do you want me? From behind or on my knees?” HAHAHA.)
ahahah yeah, gotta love spooky + cute all in one package!
love it!
<3
also check this out:
http://www.wretch.cc/album/micolas0626
Ooh the Jack Skellington one is neat!
wow some of those phones are crazy!! XD its like decorating a cake! i don’t know how they keep all the stuff on! D8
hahah I think a lot of it is for the look and not very practical… which is why I kept mine relatively simple and flat! :P
yes i got a picture of my pet in my phone like a wallpaper
Aww1
Yay for Samsung! New phones are nice. I like to turn off the keypad sounds as well. And choose a ringtone… even though 99.99999% of the time my cell is on silent. And then if possible turn off the sound the phone makes when taking a picture (I hate that). I don’t think I ever had my cats as cell backgrounds… or maybe once? hmmm.
You glued all that on the actual phone? While I find the phone embellishments cute and fun to look at I don’t think I’d glue stuff on the actual phone – on a protective case yes. I guess I like to feel the smoothness of the phone when I handle it and all those bumps would be distracting. Also, there’s the factor that there’s no turning back and I get bored of stuff after a while… and I don’t change my phone for years… lol
I also wouldn’t put stickers on my laptop because they could get ruined easily. Maybe I’d paint on it. But not like I stare at the back of the screen… my laptop is like a desktop to me: home and on all the time. Maybe if I had a smaller more portable one that I’d take around with me I’d want to make it pretty. But even then I’d cover it up so that people wouldn’t see it when I’d travel with it outside because I wouldn’t want to be attacked because someone wants to steal my laptop… yeah, I’m paranoid about that, lol.
So I guess I like looking at the embellished gadgets of others but in general I wouldn’t put stuff directly on mine. Maybe it’s just that I’m expecting a certain aesthetic design, from the electronics that I buy, to begin with so in my eyes they already have a certain beauty to them.
Ha I turn off all computer bleeps and bloops as well, other than the bare necessity!
Sadly, I tend to change my phone every year or so because I always break them… fortunately, I have a good plan and only get the cheap ones :P
I also thought the stickers on the laptop would get ruined easily. Remarkably, they’ve adhered (the old laptop is 2-3 years old; I took it on my travels and everything’s still there). So I decided to put stickers on the new laptop again. :)
awww I'm so sorry you lost your beloved pet :-(
Oh, come on, Carmina. A plush teddy bear surrounded by plastic pastries screaming, “This is the dayy, the dayy I dieeeee! Alll painn is gonnnnne!” would be worth it.
(One of my favorite Combichrist tracks, by the way. Although “This Shit Will Fuck You Up” might have been even more amusing for a ringtone coming from a Japanified phone… “How do you want me? From behind or on my knees?” HAHAHA.)
love it!
also check this out:
http://www.wretch.cc/album/micolas0626
wow some of those phones are crazy!! XD its like decorating a cake! i don't know how they keep all the stuff on! D8
Ooh the Jack Skellington one is neat!
hahah I think a lot of it is for the look and not very practical… which is why I kept mine relatively simple and flat! :P
<3 Aww your dog sounds the sweetest. If you end up decora-ing your phone, let me know how it goes! Super glue!
ahahah yeah, gotta love spooky + cute all in one package!
<3
that’s sooo pretty! :O
xoxo thanks! You should decorate yours too!
yes i got a picture of my pet in my phone like a wallpaper
Yay for Samsung! New phones are nice. I like to turn off the keypad sounds as well. And choose a ringtone… even though 99.99999% of the time my cell is on silent. And then if possible turn off the sound the phone makes when taking a picture (I hate that). I don't think I ever had my cats as cell backgrounds… or maybe once? hmmm.
You glued all that on the actual phone? While I find the phone embellishments cute and fun to look at I don't think I'd glue stuff on the actual phone – on a protective case yes. I guess I like to feel the smoothness of the phone when I handle it and all those bumps would be distracting. Also, there's the factor that there's no turning back and I get bored of stuff after a while… and I don't change my phone for years… lol
I also wouldn't put stickers on my laptop because they could get ruined easily. Maybe I'd paint on it. But not like I stare at the back of the screen… my laptop is like a desktop to me: home and on all the time. Maybe if I had a smaller more portable one that I'd take around with me I'd want to make it pretty. But even then I'd cover it up so that people wouldn't see it when I'd travel with it outside because I wouldn't want to be attacked because someone wants to steal my laptop… yeah, I'm paranoid about that, lol.
So I guess I like looking at the embellished gadgets of others but in general I wouldn't put stuff directly on mine. Maybe it's just that I'm expecting a certain aesthetic design, from the electronics that I buy, to begin with so in my eyes they already have a certain beauty to them.
Ha I turn off all computer bleeps and bloops as well, other than the bare necessity!
Sadly, I tend to change my phone every year or so because I always break them… fortunately, I have a good plan and only get the cheap ones :P
I also thought the stickers on the laptop would get ruined easily. Remarkably, they've adhered (the old laptop is 2-3 years old; I took it on my travels and everything's still there). So I decided to put stickers on the new laptop again. :)
かわいいです。
wow some of those decorated phones r so pretty but def wouldnt work for a clutz like me. I havent decorated my iphone yet but my last 2 housephones were nailpolished to death lol. and my current ringtone is Larc’s FMA theme :-) but I change it often
Ahahah a lot of things in my home are nailpolished to death…
that's sooo pretty! :O
xoxo thanks! You should decorate yours too!
Aww1
“ha I once glitter nail polished the entire dash board of my old toyota-it had chrome roof racks 4 the surfboards…I miss ‘sparky’….
“ha I once glitter nail polished the entire dash board of my old toyota-it had chrome roof racks 4 the surfboards…I miss ‘sparky’….
That is quite bling. Love the Alice stickers
かわいいです。
wow some of those decorated phones r so pretty but def wouldnt work for a clutz like me. I havent decorated my iphone yet but my last 2 housephones were nailpolished to death lol. and my current ringtone is Larc's FMA theme :-) but I change it often
Ahahah a lot of things in my home are nailpolished to death…
“ha I once glitter nail polished the entire dash board of my old toyota-it had chrome roof racks 4 the surfboards…I miss 'sparky'….
“ha I once glitter nail polished the entire dash board of my old toyota-it had chrome roof racks 4 the surfboards…I miss 'sparky'….
That is quite bling. Love the Alice stickers
Those stickers are SO cool. I love them.
I really likt the way u decorated ur mobile! I did the same with mine!!! xD
I had one on my cellphone until very recently. My netbook still has my boys on the desktop ^^
I have my son – Gili the dog
as my laptop wallpaper
Those stickers are SO cool. I love them.
I really likt the way u decorated ur mobile! I did the same with mine!!! xD
I had one on my cellphone until very recently. My netbook still has my boys on the desktop ^^
I have my son – Gili the dog
as my laptop wallpaper
OMG what a coincedence my Paper im writing for University actually happens to be on the topic of Japanese Phone Decorating the term is called Decoden if i recall….OMG i’m taking a break from writing it to read your blog which i havent in a while because of uni, so sorry TT^TT but omg looks like i cant escape the work so easily >.<
haha that’s so funny! Tell me more about decoden — what’s your paper about?
Decoden is basically the act of Decorating ones personal devices (like my headphones im currently attempting to deco for a uni assignment) with cute objects made from clay or something similar and tiny gems and beads and there is actually a decoden school in japan i think, not sure i read it somewhere, basically my paper is on the “modification of consumer products by the user” and im relating mine to japanese phone decorating ^.^
Very cool. I’ve seen a lot of books about these in the craft section of Japanese bookstores — some of the work is amazingly intricate!
haha yeah i went to a japanese bookstore yesterday to look for this magazine on decoden but then i got distracted by Kera >.>
haha that happens to me all the time +__+
OMG what a coincedence my Paper im writing for University actually happens to be on the topic of Japanese Phone Decorating the term is called Decoden if i recall….OMG i'm taking a break from writing it to read your blog which i havent in a while because of uni, so sorry TT^TT but omg looks like i cant escape the work so easily >.<
haha that's so funny! Tell me more about decoden — what's your paper about?
Decoden is basically the act of Decorating ones personal devices (like my headphones im currently attempting to deco for a uni assignment) with cute objects made from clay or something similar and tiny gems and beads and there is actually a decoden school in japan i think, not sure i read it somewhere, basically my paper is on the “modification of consumer products by the user” and im relating mine to japanese phone decorating ^.^
Very cool. I've seen a lot of books about these in the craft section of Japanese bookstores — some of the work is amazingly intricate!
oh my gosh those cells are adorable! ^-^
I can never make up my mind on what I want, so I brought a few of the plastic covers for my DS and decorated those. That way I can change them whenever I feel like it.
Ah, that’s a good idea! I looked for covers for my new phone, but there weren’t any that fit it (since it was just released…)
oh my gosh those cells are adorable! ^-^
haha yeah i went to a japanese bookstore yesterday to look for this magazine on decoden but then i got distracted by Kera >.>
I can never make up my mind on what I want, so I brought a few of the plastic covers for my DS and decorated those. That way I can change them whenever I feel like it.
haha that happens to me all the time +__+
Ah, that's a good idea! I looked for covers for my new phone, but there weren't any that fit it (since it was just released…)
What material do you use to stick the items on your phone? And where do you get it? Is it some glue?
I merely used stickers and sealed them in place with clear nail polish… the process is described in the blog post :)
What material do you use to stick the items on your phone? And where do you get it? Is it some glue?
I merely used stickers and sealed them in place with clear nail polish… the process is described in the blog post :)
Would someone be able to tell me how to turn off the keypad tones for the Samsung Forever? Thanks!
Would someone be able to tell me how to turn off the keypad tones for the Samsung Forever? Thanks!
I want to decorate my laptop but I dont know how glue would make mu compy react D:… though I might just bling it out with all my sailor moon stickers hahaha! and have you ever tried nail polish on a laptop >.> I might just try that
I did give it a cute wallpaper though (and I named it Kiko :D)
I haven’t tried nailpolish on a computer… it should be ok as long as you don’t clog up the vents. I’ve put stickers on 2 laptops to date, and they’ve never peeled off (as long as they’re not paper stickers).
I want to decorate my laptop but I dont know how glue would make mu compy react D:… though I might just bling it out with all my sailor moon stickers hahaha! and have you ever tried nail polish on a laptop >.> I might just try that
I did give it a cute wallpaper though (and I named it Kiko :D)
I haven't tried nailpolish on a computer… it should be ok as long as you don't clog up the vents. I've put stickers on 2 laptops to date, and they've never peeled off (as long as they're not paper stickers).
though I might just bling it out with all my sailor moon stickers hahaha! and have you ever tried nail polish on a laptop
Not on a laptop, but it might work…
Not on a laptop, but it might work…
Holy crap
I have that same exact rat toy for my cat U.u
haha funny! My cat has a blog too, http://www.lacarmina.com/basilfarrow
xo