Outfit Concrit

Concrit is short for Constructive Criticism, which is a comment from a peer or mentor that seeks to help someone improve a skill or creative piece. Requests for concrit are often seen on online art communities, where artists seek help from other artists to improve their art skills.

Lolita Fashion outside of Japan initially had a small adoption, and it was initially hard to obtain items from Japanese shops. As online commerce has progressed, Shopping Services have become more common, the fashion has become more popular outside of Japan, and print and digital media from Japanese sources has increasingly become more available, one’s options for learning about lolita and obtaining lolita items have greatly expanded.

However, in the earlier days of lolita fashion outside of Japan, the vast majority of people did not easily have access to actual lolita items or media from Japan, and with the fashion not yet being so popular, many didn’t have local communities of experienced lolita that they could learn from. So, it became common for people to post photos of their outfits (called coords, which is short for coordinate) online and ask for feedback.

The tradition of sharing your daily look and specifically asking for feedback continues on, and is a great way for new lolita to improve their coordination skills. Looking through coordinate sharing communities is also a great way to get inspired by other lolita from around the world.

Common places to post include, but are not limited to:

• Daily Lolita on Live Journal
• Closet of Frills on Facebook
• Local community pages on Facebook and Livejournal
• Tumblr
• Personal Facebook Pages
• Personal Blogs
• Twitter
• General Outfit Sharing Sites

Tips for Posting yourself

When posting to a lolita specific outfit sharing site, always first read the rules. It’s best to include a well lit, full body outfit shot. Detail images can be posted as well (like a selfie of your face, or a close up of an accessory) as long as they are accompanied by a full body photo.

If you are taking a photo in your house, tidy up the area that will show in the background; it looks very messy if there are clothes or trash strewn on the floor behind you.

Be accurate with your description if you give one; don’t call a bodyline dress AP, and don’t post to a community that is specific to a certain brand while wearing a counterfeit piece from that brand, or something so small as to be insignificant (for example, posting to an Angelic Pretty community when you are only wearing an Angelic Pretty ring).

Be specific about if you want concrit or not when posting to a community where people commonly give concrit, like Daily Lolita of Closet of Frills.

Enjoying Posts by Others

If someone has specified that they do not want concrit, do not criticize their coordinate. You can post a compliment, but no suggestions for improvement, or criticism.

Do not download and redistribute photos from a closed group, or from social media, of non-celebrities without their permission. If you want to share someone’s photos, share a link back to the original instead of downloading and re-uploading. Tumblr and FB both have great link-sharing options.

Do not repost pictures of people on other websites to criticize them, especially if they have specified that they do not want concrit.

When giving concrit, always be constructive. If there is something you don’t like, explain why you don’t like it. Suggest an alternative that would improve it when you can.

Do not criticize people’s weight, skin color, physical features, disabilities, or gender. It’s one thing to tactfully suggest a different cut of dress or blouse if someone is wearing something that doesn’t flatter their body, or to suggest someone tries a different blouse color if they have chosen a blouse that clashes with their skin tone IF they have asked for that type of feedback. It’s another thing all together to comment that someone is fat/ugly/skinny/short/tall/manly/too dark/too pale. When people post to a fashion community for concrit, they are asking for help making the fashion look the best it can on their body. They are not asking how to transform their body into the body of a model. There will always be someone who better fits into the current beauty trends (even if it’s Photoshopped), everyone knows this. The weight-loss and makeup industries thrive off of making women (and men) insecure about their bodies.

Using the compliment sandwich method is a great way to give concrit. Start out with something you like, follow that by a way they can improve, and end with something else you like. If you genuinely like their look and you are making a very nit-picky suggestion, by all means, tell them that!

Don’t give people false compliments, especially newbies.  If you compliment someone on something they did poorly, it can make it harder for them to figure out how to improve, and it can come across as insincere. Look for something in their coordinate that you do like. Maybe their dress is a great color, or they have cute shoes or tights.

Taking it a Step Further

So, you want to go beyond polite and into the realms of being quite nice? Challenge yourself to make positive comments on posts in places like Closet of Frills and Daily Lolita, and to make use of like and reblog options on Facebook and Tumblr instead of passively scrolling.

Or, you could make valentines of others and submit them to lolita valentines (See Lolita Etiquette: Lolita Valentines).