Botanic Gardens Revisted: Lolita Meet

The Highland Lolita community have become regular visitors at the Botanic Gardens in Inverness. I've written about meets held there, starting with our ::first ever community meet:: when there were only 3 of us and I didn't have a proper Lolita outfit yet, and then a ::summer meet:: in 2015, and the ::Tea Party Club photoshoot::, also in 2015. We went there last year, too, but I didn't get time to write about it. This post is about when went there back in April, but I didn't have time to write about it at the time because of college work.

This was a meet that I organised, but I still ended up hideously late because first one of my shoes broke, and then the bus I was on to Inverness arrived just as the bus to the Botanic Gardens was leaving, so I missed my connection. I ended up meeting a slightly lost lady on the bus, with her young daughter (who had fabulous floral face-paint) trying to get to the nearby Aquadome (municipal swimming pools and gym) for a birthday party, so I showed her how to walk around to where she was heading because currently there is a lot of road-building going on, and the usual entrance to the road down which both the Aquadome and the Botanic Gardens are situated is a construction zone. By the time I got to the Botanic gardens, my friends had already eaten and drunk most of their afternoon tea, so we then went out to the gardens. 

Plants & Flowers at the Botanic Gardens. Photos by me.

As often happens we got photographed a bit by other people visiting the gardens, but nobody was too invasive or rude. People often think we're dressing up for a special occasion, but while we're not necessarily daily Lolitas, many of us wear elaborate alternative fashion on a daily basis - whether it's my Romantic and anachronistic Gothic fashion, or fairy-kei and other Japanese street-styles on others, and I do sometimes wear Lolita just because I can - the question "do you dress like this every day?" can be a tricky one. It's a bit easier when I'm on my own and get asked that question - I can answer "this particular outfit and style is for <insert event here> but I do wear elaborate Gothic outfits every day, yes" - a lot of people can't tell Gothic Lolita apart from regular Romantic Goth, to many it's just the same thing but with knee-length skirts. Other Lolita styles, however, are clearly different from any other fashion or subcultural style. 

Koi and other fish - picture by Kawaii Keke-Chan

My favourite part of the Botanic Gardens is the cactus house, but we didn't get that far in this visit. My second favourite is the tropical greenhouse. It has a fish-pond with waterfall, but due to an issue with the pump, it no longer goes into the stream under the path, which is sad. I love watching the koi fish and other carp (goldfish?) in the pool. They're very beautiful. 

Keke-Chan and H, photo by Koneko

There are steps in the tropical greenhouse leading up to a mezzanine all dripping with climbing plants and beautiful flowers, with fancy railings and even fancier metal furniture.

Koneko, picture is, I think, by me.

As it is in a greenhouse, with a glass roof, it is quite ,bright there! We all sat down and chatted for a while, admiring the full view of the tropical house, and walking up past the waterfall. It's all very beautiful and elegant - and quite warm inside, regardless of the rain outside. One day I will have to take a packed lunch with me (from the café by the entrance), and sit up there to eat it with the sounds of the fountain and the waterfall. The grotto I was photographed in for the ::Tea Party Club photo-shoot:: is beneath the mezzanine. 

Koneko infront of the wishing fountain, picture by herself.

Photo of me by Koneko

We then went to the rear of the tropical green-house, which has a wishing-fountain (you throw coins in to make a wish), and the rear of the grotto, which is all neo-classical and completely different from its rocky exterior on the fish-pond. There's even a colourful stained-glass window commemorating something to do with a bank.

One interesting thing is that there is an artificial tree that has been built to grow the sort of rainforest plants that grow secondary on trees. The artificial tree is made from sustainably harvested cork, and rather twisty and fun. It has colourful flowers growing on it, and long strains of silvery, lace-like plants dripping from it. I don't know what the lacy plant is, but I would love to grow some myself as it looks quite magical. 

One of the things I like about my local Lolita community is that we're not affraid to be silly now and then, and have a bit of fun. We're quite laid-back, and make sure we don't take ourselves too seriously... like in this photo where Koneko snuck up and photo-bombed me!

Koneko photo-bombing me. I forgot who took this pic!

A few of the younger girls were at the meet, too, but to protect their privacy as they're legally minors in the UK, I haven't featured photographs of them here. Koneko has a facebook page/blog ::here:: andKawaii Keke-Chan's got an account on ::Tumblr::

Outfit Rundown

Photo by Kawaii Keke-Chan

✯ Head-dress: Hand-made by myself

✯ Wig: An online Cosplay shop, but I can't remember which.

✯ Blouse: Spin-Doctor

✯ Dress: second-hand Bodlyine dress

✯ Necklace: Claire's Accessories

✯ Belt: charity shop find

✯ Floral tights: I can't remember, but probably Tesco

✯ Shoes: Demonia shoes bought secondhand on eBay

This outfit was meant to be a simple all-black outfit. I was initially going to wear a black wig, too, but decided to go with this dark green one. The wig has a LOT of volume, so I wore an extra-puffy set of petticoats to balance it. There's no real theme to it, and the design of the dress is just Lolita - not particularly Gothic elements, just lots of ruffles.

In future I want to put together more outfits that aren't just all black and anachronistic, but more Gothic - more elements that tie to the usual motifs - skulls, bats, Gothic architecture, vampires, graveyards, ghosts, etc. as well as cuts that are more Gothic - things with lacing details, big bell sleeves, velvet, using spikes and studs as an accenting detail, etc. I think I need to slowly bing in more of my 'Goth' to my Lolita, making it really Gothic Lolita, not just a 'Goth in Lolita'!

Highland Lolitas Botanic Garden Meet-Up

I organised my first meet for the Highland Lolitas community for the 7th of July. We are a very new and small community. We had our first proper meet up as high tea at the Royal Highland Hotel back in March, but this was just before my hiatus and I did not get to blog about it. If people request a retrospective blog post about the first ever Highland Lolta community meet up, then I can probably do a blog post about it. I have organised a mini-meet at the Botanic Gardens before, and I blogged about that ::here:: but that is when there were only the three of us and we had not formed a community because our numbers were too small. There are now about 8 active memembers in our community, and our meets are usually between 3 and 6 people in attendance, so it is still a very small community. 

Photograph by Danielle

There was actually a meet up in Culloden for International Lolita Day, but I chose to go the big Scottish Lolitas community meet in Edinburgh instead (I felt a bit like I'd accidentally ended up as the 'Highland representative' as I got a few questions about our small community) and while I don't regret going to Edinburgh, I wish I could bilocate and have gone to both! A few of the girls met up on the same day as ZombieNess, which again put me in the position of having to choose, and as this was the first ZombieNess and the council were trying to guage interest to see if it would be run again, attending that with my friends seemed like a priority as we wanted to show our support on hopes of it happening again in future years. I was left feeling like I was abandoning our nascent Lolita community, and thus decided to organise a meet-up myself. 

Better size view. Photograph by Danielle

I chose the Inverness Botanic Gardens (Floral Hall) because it is a very beautiful location, has an on-site cafe that serves teas and cakes (with delightful antique-style crockery), it has both indoor and outdoor sections so we could have an enjoyable visit regardless of the weather, and because when we had our mini-meet before, they were very welcoming of us despite us all looking so very unusual, and seemed intrigued in a positive way rather than thinking we might be a detriment to their custom. It was also an all-ages venue, and as the youngest in our community is 14, I did not want anyone to feel left out. 

Sitting on a bench with my umbrella as a parasol. Changeable weather!
Photo by Danielle.

Organising the meet-up is actually quite a bit of work; I was helping girls with their travel arrangements (like which busses to take), ran a poll to find out the most convenient date and had to work out where we would meet, whether there were going to enough of us to ring ahead and book tables, etc. I think organising a meet-up that involves a booking, much larger numbers and perhaps group travel would be a really large amount of work, so I am very grateful to all those at the Scottish Lolita community who organise things like the tea-parties at the Willow Tea Rooms and the recent International Lolita Day meet (which I blogged about ::here::). 

Danielle, in a lovely Sweet Lolit outfit. Photograph by me.

We met up at the Eastgate Centre in Inverness (the shopping mall), as it is a central public space, and open enough for us to all immediately recognise each other by our outfits (quite distinct from the regular fashion in Inverness!). The initial plan was to meet up in the food-court, but all of us seemed to have the idea to go into Claire's and look for floral head-decorations, beforehand so we ended up meeting up there instead! Before I got into the mall, the weather was a bit dreich, but it had been sunny earlier, and I thought perhaps it might only shower lightly. When we got out of the mall it was more than mere drizzle, and it rapidly became downpour. We rapidly got totally soaked - or "drookit" as it is in Scots. We had our umbrellas with us, but they were useless against wind-driven rain that just blew under our umbrellas and drenched us. We did not get as far as bus to the outskirts of town in one go - we gave up, and decided to hide in the So CoCo cafe until the rain passed, or at least stopped raining quite as hard. It transpired that nobody else at the meet had tried macarons, so I bought a box of macarons to share. Once the rain died down, we walked the rest of the way to the bus, and then took the bus to the botanic gardens. The rain had flooded many of the paths, so we had to walk around the long way. Once we got to the gardens the weather started to improve. 

I'm growing! I'm growing! Photo by Danielle

I am considerably taller than all the others in the group; I am  5'9½" without heels on, and I was wearing 4½ inch heels above that, making me approximately 6'2" with heels on! Even without heels I am quite a bit taller than the other group members with their heels on, so I towered like an giantess over them. Within the hot-house, there is a room that is part of the staff area and is underneath the waterfall section and mezanine terrace; I would presume it is the pump-house for the waterfall and pools. The entrance is a door that is under the average door height, and I had fun standing in the doorway and pretending that I was suddenly growing like Alice from Alice in Wonderland, when she eats the 'Eat Me' cake!

We had a wander around the hot-houses of the Botanic Gardens, took lots of photographs, admired the flowers and the fish (there is an indoor koi pool in the hot house, and several ponds in the outdoor gardens), and then we visited the cactus house, which is my favourite part of the botanic gardens. After we had visited all the indoor parts, we visited the outdoor gardens, which are quite extensive. Several visitors took photosgraphs of us; all our outfits were on themes that fitted in with the aesthetics of the gardens, so we must have looked just right for photographs! One chap with a rather fancy camera took photographs for us, which was very nice, and then we had them e-mailed to us, which is very nice! I have been photographed hundreds of times while out and about elaborately dressed, but I have only seen about 5 of those photographs taken by strangers. In this age of smart-phones, wi-fi hotspots and social media, it is really not difficult to send me at least a link!

We then had cake and snacks in the cafe, before finally heading back into town on a double-decker bus, being quite silly and sitting at the front of the top deck and pretending we were super-heroes flying through the city! When we got back to the town centre, I found out that Danielle and one of the other girls are street performers in Inverness too - I busk playing the recorder, and they do dances and singing. I watched them perform, and then went off (and actually did some performing of my own as I often carry my recorder with me in case the opportunity comes up!).

I apologise for the lack of group photographs, but most of them include group members who are quite young, and I did not feel it was appropriate to post them on my public blog. 

PicMonkey collage of Danielle's photos. PicMonkey's clip-art.

I went for a Classic Lolita in old-school black-and white instead of outright Gothic as I was aiming for something more summery. The weather started off sunny, then went through torrential rain (hence the umbrella) complete with sideways rain (the umbrella was useless), then to rather sunny, and then back to rain again! It was really hard to try and dress for the weather because it was so changeable. The only thing that was constant about it all was the warmth and the humidity. Oh the Scottish summer!

Outfit rundown: ❀ Wig: Coscraft ❀ Old-school headdress: handmade by me ❀ White hair roses (not part of the bush!): Claire's ❀ Choker: cheap lace choker from eBay which I modified by adding a cameo from Rock and Roar and removing some of the tacky beads from ❀ Blouse: Metamorphose ❀ Black fabric ❀ Rose pin: thrifted ❀ JSK: Baby, The Stars Shine Bright ❀ Tights (rose-pattern): I've forgotten, but it was some bridal supplier ❀ Shoes: Fiore ❀ Gloves: Claire's ❀ Umbrella: Primark 

I would love constructive criticism! I would really like for suggestions on how to improve this outfit. Please remember I was dressing for summer, hence why this is not a very elaborate outfit, and why I am only wearing one petticoat with my dress. I am 5'9½" before heels, so the dress is a bit short on me, but the weather was so clammy, and all my underskirts are quite thick so I decided to just bend the rules a bit instead.