Category Archives: Being Fashionable

Gothic Charm School + Gloomth Giveaway on Tumblr!

Hey pumpkin! Do you want a chance to win a pair of Gloomth’s “Pumpkin Rump” bloomers? Of course you do, don’t be silly. So quick! Scamper over to this post on the Gothic Charm School Tumblr to enter!

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Of Fashion Choices and of Feeling Like A Fake

Hello Snarklings! Eventually the Lady of the Manners will get her bewildering array of projects under some sort of control and get back to writing new lessons for Gothic Charm School in a more frequent, regularly-scheduled fashion. Eventually. But let’s not dwell on the months that have passed since the last post, let’s jump into questions from readers! For this installment of Gothic Charm School, the Lady of the Manners decided to feature letters from readers that have questions and qualms about how they present themselves. The first letter is from Mistet Dreamer, with a question about proper attire: Continue reading

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Of Being Compared To Pop Stars, And Of Finding Plus-Size Goth Fashion

Hello oh patient Snarklings! Yes, it’s time for another Gothic Charm School post with reader questions! This time there are two fashion-related questions: where to find plus-sized Goth clothes, and what to do when well-meaning family members have no real frame of reference for your personal style.
Continue reading

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Of Gentlemen’s Summerwear and of Alternative Genders

Hello Snarklings! Yes, the Lady of the Manners has dragged herself away from playing with dolls and reading vampire books to answer reader letters! A letter asking for some fashion advice, and two different letters touching on the trans* and genderqueer communities. This is one of the posts at Gothic Charm School where the Lady of the Manners is going to open up the comments in order to get (she hopes!) even more advice and support for the dilemmas being addressed here. However, as always, the comments will be moderated. (Does the Lady of the Manners have to point out that flaming, trolling, and hateful speech are not tolerated here? She would assume not, but better safe than sorry.) Continue reading

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Show And Tell: h. naoto Fashion Show at SakuraCon!

Hello Snarklings! This round of Show and Tell is less a review of items, and more burbling about an event! The fifteenth annual Sakura-Con was a few short weeks ago, and the Lady of the Manners was delighted to attend. Sakura-Con is an event that is focused on Japanese animation, comics, gaming, and cultural arts. Over the past few years, Gothic + Lolita fashion has become a larger presence at the event, including attendees dressed in their finest frills, and fashion shows from some well-known Japanese alternative fashion designers!

h. naoto is a brand the Lady of the Manners has admired ever since she first saw photos of their designs in an early volume of the Gothic + Lolita Bible. Their blend of slashed and deconstructed punk details and Gothic Victorian black lace and tulle was eye-catching, and looked like the garments were designed to be worn in (admittedly very fashionable) daily life, not just saved for special photo shoots. Continue reading

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Of Someone Not Sure About This Whole Goth Thing

Hello Snarklings! In this installment of Gothic Charm School, the Lady of the Manners is going to revisit a question that turns up somewhat frequently in the Gothic Charm School mailbox; this time, however, there’s a bit of a twist to it.

Stranded Fashionista wrote with what they call a bit of an existential crisis:

question: How do you know if you’re Goth or not? I’ve never considered myself anywhere close to Goth- but my friends who are more versed in the culture have pointed out that a lot of the things I like are “Goth.” It’s odd to think that I may be part of a sub-culture that I’ve sub-consciously judged for a lot of my life. I’m not exactly sure what help you can give- but, this is causing me a bit of existential crisis.

Continue reading

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Show And Tell: Spin Doctor Clothing!

Guess what, Snarklings? It’s time for the long-promised review of Spin Doctor Clothing! Yes, really; the Lady of the Manners has been meaning to write up this review for over a year now, but agents of chaos kept thwarting that plan. Anyway! I first discovered Spin Doctor around a year and a half ago, when I was indulging in one of my periodic insomnia-fueled searches of “Gothic Victorian” on eBay. I kept finding items that were utterly charming, with the sort of dark Victorian-but-not-entirely-historically-accurate flair that I prefer in clothing; skirts, waistcoats, jackets, and blouses all made by a company I’d not yet run across. A few days later, after I’d caught up on my sleep, I decided to look at those items again and see if I still was charmed by them, or if it was another case of magpie-brain caused by sleep deprivation.

No, it wasn’t. The items from Spin Doctor were just as enticing as I had remembered. So enticing, in fact, I gave in to temptation and bought myself the “Harriet” waistcoat. Continue reading

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An Assortment Of Questions

Hello Snarklings! It’s time to return to a potpourri of reader questions here at Gothic Charm School, including, oh yes, another question about Goth fashion. Which prompts the Lady of the Manners to say that she is working on a huge upcoming post about Where To Find Goth Clothes and How To Put Together Your Gothy Style, however, when the Lady of the Manners says it’s a huge post, she’s not kidding. So it may take a little while to finally coalesce and appear here on Gothic Charm School. (Yes, Gothic Charm School sees a lot of questions about finding gothy clothes. That, and many, many questions about family disapproval. Which tells the Lady of the Manners that she needs to do big blanket posts on both topics.)

But! Those are projects for the future, and the Lady of the Manners should really concentrate on the questions she’s going to talk about this time around, which are ”¦ hmmm, a question about fashion, a query about explaining one’s gothy self to one’s mom, and ”¦ oh! About Halloween! Continue reading

Posted in Being Fashionable, General, Holidays & Special Occasions | 28 Comments

Of Dealing With Vague and Repressive Dress Codes

Hello Snarklings! This time around at Gothic Charm School, the Lady of the Manners is going to address a subject she’s talked about before, but one that is a never-ending concern: school dress codes.

The Lady of the Manners often thanks her lucky (dark) stars that the trend for all-encompassing, yet vague, school dress codes hadn’t taken root during her scholastic career. (The Lady of the Manners also thanks her lucky dark stars that things like Facebook, Twitter, and LiveJournal were not around during her semi-over-emotional teens and early twenties, but that’s a different post entirely.) The Lady of the Manners understands, to a degree, what school boards are trying to achieve with the dress codes; if students all have a similar appearance, then in theory there might be fewer disruptions and bullying because of a student’s clothing. (The Lady of the Manners has been told there are studies showing that school uniforms, not vague dress codes, have indeed helped cut down on bullying.) However, the Lady of the Manners also knows that it doesn’t matter if there is a dress code, the students will still find things to harass and haze each other about, and feels that the time spent drafting school dress codes would be better spent on finding strategies to deal with bullying. Maybe someday these things will happen. Say, when we live in a perfect world, or when the Lady of the Manners finally achieves her girlhood dream of becoming the gothy vampire queen of the universe. Continue reading

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Review: Heavy Red Clothing

Heavy Red, Snarklings! You do know of what the Lady of the Manners speaks, don’t you? Heavy Red, purveyors of all sorts of enticing darkware for elegantly spooky and fetchingly tattered gothlings of all genders. Continue reading

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