Happening now, Seattle Art Museum's tremendous Future Beauty: 30 Years of Japanese Fashion contains so many styles in so many shapes, so many fabrics, and by so many talented designers, like Yohji Yamamoto, Rei Kawakubo, and Jun Takahashi, that it's easy to get overwhelmed, I know. But you've got to pick something to start with. Perhaps you're super into soft, round, puffy, huggable things? Because who isn't! Come to the "Cool Japan" gallery, and I'll show you around.

This part of the exhibit investigates Tokyo's street-wear aesthetics, and a pair of Lolita fashion gowns by Kumiko Uehara of Baby, the Stars Shine Bright rests near the entrance. The cute just rolls in. A confectionary of lace, ribbons, embroidery, bows, ruffles, some more ruffles, Victorian cuffs, stockings, aprons, pinafores, pochettes, bonnets, pendants, and garters—these ensembles pair well with nursery-rhyme celebrities, or video-game heroines, or girls who live in small, tidy rooms suffused in rainbow vapor, with plush toys everywhere arranged in rows.

Near the dresses is a rubber-boot set with matching silk-charmeuse cape by Naoki Takizawa for Issey Miyake. It's patterned with Aya Takano's spindly cartoon print depicting seminude alien figures in bubble helmets drifting over a surreal landscape, and it manages to appear both bleak and charming at once. Another outfit is a hyper-casual-garage-sale-Easter-candy-rodeo-clown-pajama-party compilation by anonymous designers, with errant pom-poms, layers, dingle-ball trims, piles of plastic jewelry, and gingham prints probably left over from the curtains of gingerbread houses. There are tons of strawberries, too—they're a dominant theme in Japan's culture of cuteness.

Sharon Kinsella discussed this complicated topic in her essay "Cuties in Japan." The movement embodies the region's postwar disillusionments, prolongs the shift from adolescence into adulthood, simultaneously skirts and heightens erotic expression, and brings us an impressive range of trends and products. There's the stylized "kitten writing" penmanship, with wobbly rounded shapes, and random insertions of hearts and faces into text. And babyish slang words—"sex" is nyan nyan suru, or "to meow meow." There's ladies' underwear, constructed with hefty amounts of elastic so it will stretch to fit, but off the body taking the shape of little girls' panties. And can openers come inscribed with messages: "This can-opener is not just a kitchen tool. Treat it kindly and it will be our loyal friend." recommended

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