My Mori Origins: How I First Discovered Mori Kei

Something I always find fascinating is hearing how members of the mori community first found the fashion. What made them fall in love with it for the first time? How did they discover it in the first place? What was the first photo they saw? Or the first one that really made them want to try mori out for themselves?

I've talked a few times on this blog about my own mori origins, but in bits and pieces here and there. So, today, I thought it would be fun to tell the story from its beginning. So, here is how I first discovered mori!

It began with Japan...

If we truly want to start from the beginning, I think it's important to know about my love for Japan. To be honest, despite the fact that people ask me this constantly, I can't really tell you how this interest started. It was something I always felt, this deep interest in Japanese language and culture. Maybe it was that first time I saw Sailor Moon or Hamtaro on the TV as a kid, or perhaps it was my first Japanese friend who was so kind and sweet that I will never forget her. Who truly knows. But regardless, I have loved Japanese things for many, many years. (For those who don't know, I even ended up living there for a time! But that is another story.)

Like many people who love Japan, I stumbled across lolita/EGL fashion by chance. At the time, I fell in love with the frilly dresses and the cute silhouette. I was enraptured. I reblogged and saved pictures of EGL dresses anytime I could, and cried inside every time I looked at the price tag on my dream dresses.

It was that knowledge, that a broke middle schooler could never afford an EGL dress, that drove me to my first interaction with mori.

The Google Search

One late summer day in high school, I was doing the usual browse of EGL dresses and my daily regret that I would never own them, when it suddenly hit me. EGL fashion was always referred to with the label "J-fashion". Did that mean there were other styles out there? 

I got so excited at the prospect of another fashion style that I could more easily replicate. I googled J-fashion immediately and came across a list of names. Slowly, I googled each one. Decora, too over the top for my tastes. Visual Kei, too many dark colors for me personally. Gyaru, no way I was ever going to be comfortable wearing skirts that short. 

I got a bit discouraged for a bit. All of these were cute on the models but they didn't feel like me. I googled the next name, mori girl, and it was instant love.

I can still remember the feeling as I took in the very first mori image I had ever seen. It was this one right here. Not exactly the best representation of mori, but very representative of mori in the 2010s. I was hooked.

The silhouette, the color palettes, the imagery of nature which had been a huge part of my life since childhood, all of it was so very, very me.

I remember having this deep, visceral reaction. In a matter of seconds, it was like my soul had re-aligned itself. At the risk of sounding overdramatic, it was almost like a spiritual connection. I was a mori girl. And that was the style I wanted to wear for the rest of my life.

At this point in my life, I didn't have any friends who wore alt fashion. The only person I knew interested in fashion at all was my mom. 

My mom is awesome, by the way. She's always been my cheerleader in everything, but especially expressing myself through clothes and hair. She was a model and fashionista growing up, so she was the reason I had a pink streak in my hair as a child. She helped me dye it herself and shooed off my poor confused dad who couldn't understand why on earth I would want to do that to my head. She never laughed or teased when I tried weird clothes to be fashionable as a middle schooler. Granted, I failed, as knee high converse with Bermuda shorts or lace up elbow length gloves with t-shirts isn't really the vibe. But she always praised me for expressing myself.

Anyways, back to the story at hand. Immediately after deciding mori was for me, I ran and told my mom about it. After showing her a few pictures, she was just as all in as I was, and we made plans for how to start building my mori wardrobe.

The Thrift Trip

My mom is a passionate thrifter. She didn't grow up with much, so she learned the art of finding great deals for anything and everything. As a child I regularly visited thrift stores with her instead of mainstream stores for my clothes. So I'm also a regular thrifter.

The two of us hit up the local thrift store with a passion. We browsed every aisle, threw so many things into the cart, and frankly made some strange thrift choices, but left with a small but cute mori wardrobe.

I took everything home and laid it out excitedly, only to realize my first problem: I had no idea how to put together a coordinate. Thankfully, my mom came to the rescue, coaching me through it and suggesting different combination. By the end of our little session I had my first coordinate planned. Now I just needed somewhere to wear it.

The First Coord

My first coord was, honestly, not so bad. I only realized now as I was putting this post together that it actually matched the vibes of the first mori coordinate I ever saw very well.

I've posted about it before in detail on this blog, but it consisted of a sleeveless denim dress, a brown undershirt, white underskirt, brown tights and shoes, a creme shawl, a basket I decorated with lace myself from the thrift store, and a few random accessories.

It looks pretty good for a first coordinate, but it wasn't without its issues. The skirt and dress hems didn't match so I rolled up the skirt to shorten it, causing the hem to be uneven. The dress pockets needed ironing and turned up at the edges. The shawl was actually a crochet lace tablecloth that was not big enough to be a shawl and kept falling off my shoulders. The basket was a bit rough and kept snagging on my clothes.

All of those things are true, but at the time, I didn't care about any of it. I felt so cute, at home in my clothes for the first time, and nothing could bring down my mood!

Old instagram photos of my first coordinate and the DIY basket!

I wore the coord out for a family function. My extended family was visiting from out of town, and we were going out to dinner as a group. A perfect time for a high schooler like me to wear out a nice outfit.

My uncle's wife at the time was a very modern, fashionable lady. She was nice enough about it but questioned what exactly I was wearing, and gave me some weird looks. My grandma, who always loved vintage fashion, gave me lots of compliments. And everyone else just kind of ignored it (fair enough). But I didn't care. I was far too happy to be bothered by what anyone thought. 

I guess that brings me back to something I hear a lot of mori folk say. Many of us talk about how wearing or seeing mori for the first time feels natural. It feels like coming home. It feels like something we always felt, or maybe even wore, before we knew it had a name. The same is true for me. Embracing mori fully was easy, because it matched the things I had always felt. It gave me a way to express a bit of myself that I never could before.

Today, I wear mori less due to a number of factors, but the original mori look I was drawn to is still what I love. I still feel that thrill of happiness when I throw on an outfit. It still feels like coming home.

So how about you? What was your first coordinate like? When did you first find mori fashion? I would love to read all about how you fell in love with mori for the first time. Until next time, my deers!