Popularity of "Puchipura"
Puchipura (petit prices) are popular with girls. If you have 2,000 yen to spend, you can buy cute clothes and accessories. Puchipura modeled in magazines can be fashion hits. © GRL
Young girls want to look cute, but don't have much money to spend, so "puchipura" are popular with preteen and teenage girls. The word puchipura is a shortened form of "puchi puraisu" that combines the words "petit" and "price." And puchipura represent small and inexpensive fashion accessories. Fashion magazines regularly cover the latest puchipura that cost anywhere between 10 yen and 2,000 yen — prices that even parents appreciate. Puchipura can be just as fancy as normally priced products and include clothing with cute designs or strong fabric bags, as well as cosmetics. Some manufacturers even use adult models to show how their products can be used to create particular styles.
Puchipura range from T-shirts and bags to shorts and accessories © GRL
Preteen and teenage kids coordinate their limited wardrobe with a range of puchipura accessories to make their own fresh and fun style.
Dream to Be a Model
"I want to be a model too!" Many girls long to be part of kids' fashion shows. The magazine models are astonishingly mature in the way they strut on the runway. Girls watch these poses and dream of becoming models themselves.
Japanese fashion magazines can be the answer to these dreams. They hold auditions for readers to become models. Girls have high hopes for such opportunities and go to these auditions with the goal of being selected to pose for a magazine. If they are actually picked to model in a magazine, the next goal is to take part in kids' fashion shows. Every year, girls work hard to become a model and be the icon of their peers.
Japanese fashion is famous around the world. Girls who are interested in fashion from childhood can even grow up to be fashion designers.
(March 2013)