New York: Ozone Socks – Lolita Fashion

 Photographs courtesy Ozone Socks

New York: Ozone Socks – Lolita Fashion. Ozone Socks are a cool brand of luxury designer socks, designed by artist and designer Peter Rittmaster.  Their latest collection has been adopted by the Japanese Lolita Fashion sub-culture, now taking hold all over the world.  Lolita Fashion grants the wearer the wish to be forever a princess, whatever her age.  The “Victorian–era” inspired clothing phenomenon started on the streets of the Harajuku district in Tokyo and the name was picked for its cute girly ring rather than after the famous Nabokov character.  The signature look is made up of pretty ruffles, bows, frills, petticoats, banana curled hairstyles and bonnets in pastel colors or dark Goth colors. There are a variety of categories within the Lolita Signature Look, from Sweet Lolita, to Classic Lolita to Gothic Lolita.  Above. Sweet3 socks. 

Ozone Socks – Lolita Fashion. Ozone Socks president and CEO Laurie Mallet and creative director, partner, artist and designer Peter Rittmaster. The husband and wife team tell Contessanally about the success their socks have had with the Lolita Fashion-istas.
Peter. We have a wonderful mill in Japan, who makes our socks and they are capable of doing some amazing technical things that no one else can do. We have been designing socks for that mill, for our line, and they have become - kind of Lolita socks - and all these young sweet Lolitas have been chasing our socks, which coincidentally are made in Japan.
Laurie.  We are able to produce very feminine transparent pattered socks with the use of embroidery techniques and extremely fine yarns.  The lacey effect and the pretty patterns make them ideal for the Lolita Fashion phenomenon.

  Photographs courtesy Ozone Socks

 

Laurie. When, a few months a go, Aeryn Sylvaen started working with us at Ozone Socks in New York City, she really loved the socks and being a Lolita herself, she started wearing them, Aeryn lives in a small apartment, which is converted into a closet full of clothes and hats.  She is really amazing.
Peter. Because Aeryn is good at organizing and because she has a huge amount of Lolita clothes, she styled our photographs.
Above.  Kodona3.

   Photograph courtesy Ozone Socks

 Peter. This Lolita phenomenon is gaining momentum around the world.  For me it is very exciting and reminiscent of what happened in America in the ‘50s and the ‘60s with custom cars and hot rods.   They are an amazing American Art form.  And I see this fashion phenomenon as something very much akin to individual people just changing the way they approach fashion, just like the way they approached cars; they are individual people in a global world and they want to stand out.
Above. Dean Jefferies pin striping his high school sweetheart.

 

 Photographs courtesy Ozone Socks

 Ozone Socks – Lolita Fashion – Over-the-Knee Sweet2 socks

Photograph courtesy Ozone Socks

Ozone Socks – A custom BMW 4 door convertible. The top has been chopped off the original BMW and the car has been transformed into a four-door convertible.
Peter. These car people are not going into car dealerships to buy cars and these Lolitas are not going into shops around the world to buy fashion, because what they want is not there for them.  Both car customizers and Lolita Fashion girls did not like what was offered to them, so they created a new look that had not been seen before.
The BMW is part of the Rittmaster-Mallet car collection.