re: #213 ObserverArt
Goths in the US have been trading looks with Harajuku style forever - I’ve got a few copies of Fruits magazine that are a dozen years old. My understanding is that things like Gothic Lolita (despite the horrible implications in English) are a reaction against sexual harassment of young women - the styles are explicitly antisexual (sleeves to wrists, collars to neck, etc.) and it’s celebrating prettiness while rejecting sexiness.