Vintage Shoujo Manga at the Atkinson

This Saturday our local comm had a meetup in my town, where we visited the Atkinson art gallery and put on a fashion show as a part of the exhibition. I had such fun, and I never would have thought I'd take place in a fashion show, but I did! It was an amazing experience and I enjoyed it so much.

First of all we checked out the vintage shoujo manga exhibition at the gallery, and I was inspired by the art despite not drawing in manga style anymore. It was a dream come true to finally see a Macoto Takahashi illustration in a gallery, which you can see below! I also took photos of some of my favourite pieces, which are contain vintage clothing and big, dewy eyes and roses - extremely cute!

Mo in front of Macoto's work

Then we had a wander around the actual gallery, where we saw some stunning classical pieces and some of the history of Southport, including these historical garments. They were gorgeous, and I really loved the clothing and details in this painting.

For lunch we went to a little cafe called Cranberries, and the rest of the day was spent on the fashion show and preparation. It was so exciting!

Our comm leader, Nadina, brought along some upbeat waltz music for us to walk down the stairs to in a graceful, elegant manner, where we would stop at the bottom of the staircase and pose three times for photographs. There was a gathering of people at the bottom, who also took photos and asked questions about the fashion. I felt like a debutante walking down those stairs in waltz time - incredibly serene and princess-like, which makes a change to my usual shy, awkward demeanor! Somebody also said that I looked like an oil painting, which really boosted my confidence, as I love oil paintings and wish I looked like one of its subjects!
Everyone was fabulous and looked amazing, even changing their wigs for the second outfit change - that was a lot of effort, I just changed my JSK from Baby's Shirring Princess to Innocent World's Antique Cherub Candlestick. We got a loud round of applause at the end, which was also lovely, and some sweet little girls went about hugging the comm members and calling us princesses - so sweet!

A photo that the gallery took of me - please excuse my derp face!

 Here's my first outfit that I wore, with a few changes. I scrapped the headbow based on my hairstyle, and exchanged it for a simple diamante headband, and I changed the shoes to black Mary Janes for more of a frumpy, old school look.

 
Edit: Look at this adorable video that Georgia made of our meetup!