Essentials of Japanese Summer

An essential part of Japanese summer is of course Hanabi, fireworks shows, and wearing a Yukata (thin summer kimono; still wearing it is certainly less comfortable and hotter than your average maxi summer dress) to it.

I decided on a Yukata set which included also hair accessories, Geta (traditional sandals), Obi, and other necessaries for under 10 00 Yen. usually those sets are cheaply produced and look that way (some of the gal brands ones, like Cecil McBee, tend to be that way) but this one actual has quality and a bit of a unique use of color. The base is soft purple, which is a color I actually did not see on anyone at the last firework shows I went to, with pink, white, yellow and black flowers.

Before the Hanabi I was stressed and had no time at all for styling myself, plus I am anyway clumsy so I got dressed up and got my hair done by a hair salon. I reserved their Yukata package over the Internet the night before. Pretty abrupt but I can recommend that service to everyone! The outcome was something like this:

It maybe does not look like it but it was a pretty complicated style and lots and lots of hair pins had to be used to keep everything up. (Not very pleasing for my scalp...XD)