Gyaru


Gyaru is a Japanese transliteration of the English slang word 'gal' used to define a fashion subculture in Japan. It is rumored to be inspired by the popular late 1980s American action drama series Baywatch, that also appeared on Japanese television. The fashion style was probably created and then popularized by Pamela Anderson's role in the show at the time. It is rumored that gyaru was an exaggeration and over-representation of American teenage party culture in Japan. The term's usage peaked in the early 2000s, and has since gradually declined. This decline has been referred to as a strategy of the magazine organizations, over-exaggeration of the fashion, western media or even sometimes government policies. The meaning of the term gyaru gradually drifted to apply to a slightly older demographic whose apparent lack of interest in work or marriage resulted in these women being regarded as childish or a "hussy". Due to its past and its present connotation, it is now used almost interchangeably with kogal.
During the Heisei era, the Gyaru subculture was at its peak. It had a large influence on Japan's fashion and its economy, with multiple gyaru brands branching out before eventually declining. In Tokyo, across the intersection from the Shibuya Station is a shopping mall called Shibuya 109. This was a popular location for purchasing gyaru style clothing and was where this fashion subculture was most often seen. In the early 2000s, 109 was considered the source of the newest and trendiest items or brands for gyaru, from popular large recognized "Gal brands" to more independent local designers. Although 109 began as the primary source of gyaru style clothing, the style's growth in popularity saw brands reaching out by having their clothing available at pop-up stores in conventions or through webshops offering international shopping. Second-hand re-selling of gyaru apparel and accessories also increased their availability.

Description

Gyaru is a description of either sex, but mostly women, who follow a type of Japanese street fashion with many subcategories, many types of which originated in the 1970s. It is a fashion that is considered as not conforming to and rebelling against, the Japanese standards of its society, at the time when women were expected to be housewives, and fit Asian beauty standards of pale skin and dark hair. For women this fashion was for them to be more racy and freewheeling, with some feeling it caused a ruckus, juvenile delinquency and frivolousness.
Its popularity peaked in 1990 and early 2000. In the 2010 gyaru fashion for women was typically characterized by having heavily bleached or dyed hair, depending on the style the hair may be heavily crimped up. Tanned skin, highly elongated, decorated nails, and dramatic makeup are considered to be essential in this fashion subculture. The makeup typically consists of dark eyeliner, fake eyelashes to make the eyes appear larger, contouring of the face and nose for a slimming effect, and using colored contacts to change the color of their eyes and make the eyes appear larger. They are also known for partying or clubbing, being rather provocative, being flirtatious, and unwinding and having fun.
Apparel for gyaru fashion differs depending on which gyaru style the individual has chosen and also where they would buy their items. Japanese brands or western fast-fashion brands would determine their style in the gyaru fashion subculture. Some would have the luxury to buy from western high-end or haute couture brands, but those who lived in Japan mostly stuck to certain brands from Japan itself depending on their style, often originating from Shibuya 109.
Popular recurring gyaru models, icons and idols who may have been easily recognized during its peak were Tsubasa Masuwaka, Kumiko Funayama, Rie Matsuoka, Hikari Shiina, Satomi Yakuwa, Sayoko Ozaki, Yuka Kowara, Rina Sakurai, Nana Suzuki, and twins Chika & Chie Yoshikawa.

Common ''gyaru'' styles

There are various subcategories of "gal" fashion depending on the choice of apparel and gender.
Often referred to as foreign gyaru or western gyaru and online as gaijin gyaru. Women and even men who have found gyaru fashion outside Japan and have decided to participate in said fashion subculture. Western or gaijin gyaru created their own communities or groups and forums which they communicate among each other. They also had lists of tutorials to help beginners to gyaru, with makeup and hair tutorials.
Gyaru got its popularity outside of Japan due to the help of selling Gyaru magazines in Western countries and social media networks that helped spread this Japanese fashion style further than its origin to other parts of the world.
In 2011 this western or gaijin gyaru held their first event to spread awareness of this style, these ones lasted till 2014 and they were mostly done online. Since 2014 there wouldn't be another contest until 2019, which has held an actual event which wasn't online. These contests were made so one could vote for who would be the best suited for certain categories and gaining internet attention from peers when winning a category.
During the early 2000s, most anime conventions saw a glorification of gyaru and gaijin gyaru presence as they held gatherings or "meet's" usually organized by their gyarusa and fellow peers in these conventions in their country of residents or where their gathering would be held in.
As of 2018/2019 there was a big boom in activity for the gaijin gyaru community caused by the comeback of Egg magazine as well as the general popularity of gyaru increasing again in Japan. This has affected the gaijin gyaru community as well, but a new gaijin gyaru magazine got published in October 2019 as well as Gyaru-go making a comeback.
''Gaijin gyaru'' magazines

Clothing brands

Music is not necessarily the main hobby within gyaru culture, although J-pop and Eurobeat remixes are regularly danced to with the dance parapara, however, there are many popular Japanese singers who are casually listened to, mostly during a date or when driving a car. Singers such as Koda Kumi, Namie Amuro, and Ayumi Hamasaki are popular both in Japan and overseas, and regarded as an inspiration for many gyarus. Other J-pop artists that were considered to be essential to listen to were LOVE to LOVE, GAL DOLL, Rady and Juliet. A music group called LADYMADE often used gyaru models at the time, such as Yuka Kowara. They also listened to Eastern & Western rock, rap, and all sorts of genres, as long as it fitted the gyaru aesthetic.
Prominent models or members of the gyaru community may also try building a musical career or acting career. Tsubasa Masuwaka, Aina Tanaka & Yumachi Takahashi forming the girl group 'SHIBUYA GIRLS', Rina Sakurai having the main protagonist role in her own movie and the Black Diamond members are some of the very few prominent gyaru to have built a career.

Dancing

A regular pastime for gyaru is parapara, it is a dance performed mostly with hands and legs going back and forth, from left to right to be precise. It is mostly danced with Eurobeat music. The most infamous parapara song and the tagline is "GET WILD & BE SEXY" which was of an infamous eurobeat song of the same name, by the group called CREAM. There is a diverse choice number of songs that can be danced to parapara. There are even dedicated channels to parapara on YouTube that are still active to this day.

Hobbies

A common hobby of gyaru is Purikura. These photo booths are often used whether in a group or taking pictures in these photo booths alone, doing ridiculous or gaudy poses depending on the mood of the pictures are frequently done. These booths are mostly located in the electronic district of Tokyo, Akihabara, they were the thing to do for gyaru enthusiasts and even models participated. These booths are a creative outlet, sometimes hobbyist obsession but also in some ways it is a form of getting someone interested to get recognized for a magazine in Japan. These photo booths would often use or find the pictures one has made and posted on multiple social network services for the magazine and would often have the chance to become a Dokumo model, which these models were often referred to as by the magazines themselves. Another hobbyist activity is "Decoden" or also Keitai art, which also originated in Japan. The word "deco" comes from decorative while "den" is a paraphrasing of the words "phone" creating the term "Decoden". In its original form, it is truly ostentatious, by looks and by how heavy the actual material is, which consists mostly of polymer clay and even hardware store silicone for the cream. They would also accessorise their mobile phones with mobile phone charms or danglers. Multiple famous gyaru models participated in an advertisement called 'Deco-Pocky' which was sponsored by the magazine 'Popteen' where gaudy adds were created.

Events and meetings

A group of gyaru who would often meet each other and hang out is called a "gal circle". They are two types of groups: Nagasa, which are casual groups to hang out with each other, and Ibesa, which would plan, host, and have events with each-other. These events would consist of clubbing, karaoké, purikura, and showing off each other's outfits. One of the most famous gyaru groups is Angeleek, who predominantly wore ganguro even though the most popular styles in those circles were manba and yamanba, and which consisted of at least twelve members. They have been promoted numerous times in Egg magazine and on national Japanese television.

Cafés

The Ganguro Café in Shibuya, which once used to be the home of the gyaru and ganguro style, was closed in July 2018.

''Gyaru'' scandals in Japan

In 2012 the gyaru model Jun Komori committed fraud and helped with said fraud on an online auction website in Japan. She worked with the at the time thirty-year-old Ryusuge Suzuki, who was the penny orders section owner of the 'World Auction' website in Japan. She had to close her official web blog due to the backlash of her actions. Another later scandal happened at a Shinjuku 'Lumine EST' mall to gyaru staff members on February 3, 2015. Three 'Rady' shop staff were arrested and charged with stealing clothes. The crime occurred due to shop staff only getting paid around 880 yen an hour. The 'Rady' store was closed within the same month. Oyajigyaru : isn't a style, rather it is a title that gyaru have gotten themselves because of their manner of showing and acting out towards others on the street, these gyaru have carried as the over prevailing years of its existence of as a subculture of Japanese street fashion. Over these years of its existence, it has garnered them this title of Oyajigyaru, especially when this title has been given by the Japanese population when asked in a survey of the most used words of the decades or buzzword rather which are used on a daily basis. Because of their rudeness towards others, masculine character: such as drinking beer, smoking in public places, swearing, overtly sexual manner of dress and almost remotely relying on older men for money acting like streetwalkers. Oyajigyaru literally means an old-man girl and is used as slang to describe most revolting gyaru.

Influence in manga, anime, Internet notoriety and video games

was a manga that had an impact and a great influence on said fashion. It was created by the female mangaka Mihona Fujii in 1998 and is a shoujo manga that has become yet again quite renowned in the subculture of gyaru. A more recent manga was Gal Japon, published in 2010.
There are many others creating characters in this particular fashion subculture. For example, Peach Girl, a manga created by Miwa Ueda which started publication in 1997. A more recent one, that was published in 2016, would be Gal Gohan, a manga about cooking at school. A stop motion anime series named Milpom was created to promote the gyaru lifestyle, especially its television pilot, but in the end drifted towards other Japanese fashion subcultures. It was released in 2015 and lasted till 2017, due to lack of viewership and bad reviews. Another manga that started in 2015, was Komi Can't Communicate, a manga that does not discuss gyaru but has a ganguro in it, her name is Manbagi Rumiko. In 2014, the manga and anime series Please Tell Me! Galko-chan began, which mostly talks about gender differences, sexual behavior or body complexes and differences in both the female and male bodies. Galko-chan is the protagonist but she also has an older gyaru sister. A 2018 manga called Gal & Dino features a gyaru as the lead and eventually got an anime in 2020.
On the internet, there are many makeup tutorials and event videos of gyaru meeting each other on YouTube. There are a lot of different videos that talk about this fashion subculture, such as article videos, history videos, makeovers, and questionnaire videos. There are also parody videos about this style, one of the most famous being the 2011 video with four million views titled 'Gal o sengen' created by the Japanese music group 'POLICEMAN110' or known in Japan simply as 'ポリスマン'. It makes a farce of the gyaru lifestyle especially gyaru-o's.
The Persona series had a gyaru. In, there is a kogyaru named Yuka Ayase.
The Girls Mode series is based on multiple Japanese street fashion subcultures and has a focus on brands and had a brand that mimicked a gyaru fashion brand, the in-game brand AZ*USA. Amekaji also got its own brand named CherryBerry. This series has three sequels on the Nintendo 3DS.