Cute: style in Japan
Kitty Hauser, 15 April 2004
“Japanese ‘cute’ is a curious and very contemporary aesthetic, a style, a taste, an affectation: it denotes anything small, vulnerable and childlike that induces a feeling of pitiful love. There are cute expressions, cute gestures and cute ways of standing, with toes turned in. There are cute ways of dressing, too, especially for girls and young women: shoes with buckles, crinolined mini-skirts, mittens, toys worn as accessories, and the ubiquitous socks, some ankle-length, others longer and worn as if in the process of falling down, an effect achieved with special sock-glue.”