12 Responses for "Street Styles: A Funky Couple"

1. impolite one July 23rd, 2008 at 10:09 am 1

   cute couple, they look like they’re having fun. The girl’s hair is interesting, it reminds me of a popular style among HK Chinese girls several years back. I imagine she stands out a bit in Korea with that kind of hair.
   Are the guy’s shoes Nikes or Rick Owens knockoffs?

2. Maximus July 23rd, 2008 at 2:17 pm 2

   Only thing is that, as most of korean couples, the guy usually seems to be more girly than the girl herself. This goes beyond the metrosexual definition. But if the culture is that girls like boys with more delicate faces and outfits, good for them.
   On the other hand, you don’t hear that in China: girls like “male looking” boys, hair on the chest, and “classical” things like that (don’t know a better way to put it). Just for comparison purposes.
   Again, if k-girls like girly boys, everything is ok. Not a criticism, just an observation.

3. sf July 23rd, 2008 at 3:55 pm 3

   ^_^ I don’t really like the girl’s hair so much - so light and fake. But they are very cute

   ***

   I’ve had the same observation as Maximus. Right now at least, it seems like Korean girls favor more feminine looking guys. I’m not entirely sure if this can be paralleled to what I think is Japan’s seeming preference for ‘girly’ boys.

   I’ve always wondered where this preference came from: I mean it sounds so logical when you say the “manly man” would draw women b/c they seem like they can physically protect you. Yet perhaps ‘girly’ guys project the idea of “protection” as well from a different angle. These softer, “prettier” looking guys look more approachable, more emotionally sensitive to women - premiums in a modern society where “physical” protection per se is no longer necessary. So women seek other kinds of protection and needs - the emotional kind. But obviously this doesn’t explain why other countries where “physical protection” is no longer necessary haven’t adopted this idea as well. It could be just a simple matter, however, or simply defining “manliness” in a different way. Of course there is the simply fact that Asian guys are generally less hairy and tend to have leaner body builds…so maybe Korea just never used the idea of body/facial hair or muscles to define masculinity…and just developed a different criteria for defining manliness period.

   But I’ve noticed recently that Korea has started embracing the “manly man” look more in the celebrity world. More scruff and muscle. Even if the the body is topped with a prettier than a girl face, the guy’s body nowadays are pretty rock hard, not so slim and lean. Could be just my opinion though.

4. joanna July 23rd, 2008 at 5:32 pm 4

   omg give me her haircut

5. Maximus July 23rd, 2008 at 5:56 pm 5

   “These softer, “prettier” looking guys look more approachable, more emotionally sensitive to women - premiums in a modern society where “physical” protection per se is no longer necessary. So women seek other kinds of protection and needs - the emotional kind.”

   I tend to agree to the 1st part, and add that in a society where men are usually aggressive towards women, a girly boy would be more like a “safe choice”, that could save them from future trouble (not including here the boy’s family, of course).

6. impolite one July 24th, 2008 at 8:18 am 6

   I think that is a shopping bag in the guy’s hand, not handbag, for clarification.

   The guy is kinda meek looking, yeah, but you guys gotta realize he is probably on the younger side of 18. Probably fresh off of 13 years of slave-driven hakwon studying until midnight and this is probably the kid’s first real-deal girlfriend to boot.
   They discover a bit of personal style and swagger along the way…

7. impolite one July 24th, 2008 at 8:39 am 7

   Maximus, to note: China is pretty emerging at the moment, with the first young generation to enjoy any notable financial prosperity, so a penchant for ‘traditional’ machismo is typical and understandable. They are highly likely to evolve to something like you see on Japanese and Korean streets as they receive that influence over time.

   Koreans were pretty similar a couple generations back, men of the 60’s and 70’s were conservative, they still are to this day. They are the guys on Seoul subways with three different kinds of plaid on, and mirror polished black shoes.

   The Japanese, they are one more generation of financial prosperity ahead of the Koreans, with a unique society that pushes young people to urban centers where they live alone and create a strong singles culture, which empowers women in their romantic lives. In the mid-90’s Japan was taken by both the strong women thing, and the sensitive, romantic man craze. Thus leading to this new-age sensitive pretty boy thing that is overtaking Japan today, and trickling into Korea.

   Korea is smaller physically and Seoul is a much bigger urban base proportionally compared to Japan and its urban centers, plus Korea has mandatory conscription that pretty much kicks the shit out of most guys, physically and emotionally. By the time Korean guys come back from the Army, they are no longer so consumed by personal style and clothes, and are naturally more masculine as well, so I think the pretty boy thing is just a phase for Korean guys to go through at this age, between 18 to 22′ish, and it won’t ever get as serious as it is in Japan as a result.

   For Korean boys, they spend most of their school years wearing uniforms, many of them going to all-boys schools, and not caring about personal styling. By the time they get out of high school, it’s up to them to figure out their persona and dress style all of a sudden, so it’s usually safest to run to what they sell as complete outfits at the market, which everyone else wears as well. Outfits that happened to be styled by women, influenced by pop singing idols and actors who also propagate a ‘pretty boy’ style, and so on, it’s a circular thing just like it is for Korean girls and their super-frilly feminine thing.
   Doing something against the grain in Korea is tough for anyone, and for a young person like this, even tougher. This is the norm that has been set as far as ‘trendy young Korean men’s wear’, so it’s not really surprising that the guy dresses this way. One voice of influence is the number of guys walking around who dress exactly like this, so he probably follows suit as such, and then the other influence is the perception that girls like this and to impress them he should pick this style and way of being. Just like in any other country.

8. impolite one July 24th, 2008 at 8:58 am 8

   (my last post, i swear)

   Do you guys know about Bae Yong Joon, aka Yonsama? Koreans see him and don’t think much of him, and he is rather gross looking to boot, but he’s reached god-like status in Japan. His incredible popularity in Japan (he pretty much singlehandedly started this Korean wave that took over Asia with inordinate prosperity) can be derived from this, it’s rather simple:

   Yonsama’s housewife fanbase is almost entirely old, 40’s and up. Yonsama, in his TV dramas from several years ago, represents this by-gone masculine yet sensitive man that eludes Japanese male sterotypes. The women’s generation of men are typically conservative and not sensitive, and young generation of boys is typically the opposite, very timid and self-centered in their interests.

   Korean men are considered to be a mix of old-fashioned masculine in comparison to Japanese guys (derived from their army-toned ways, which permeates Korean society as a result) while also being very simplistically romantic and sensitive. You often see Korean men carrying their girlfriend’s handbags, bringing them bouquets of flowers on dates, paying the tab everywhere (which Japanese people will often go dutch on), anything to impress.

9. Maximus July 24th, 2008 at 12:23 pm 9

   “…anything to impress”

   Question is: after impressing, do they live up to this? Or go back to the traditional treatment husband-wife?

   Truly hope that the young boys are changing that…well, with the girls being more independent - what is great - they may have no choice at all than improving.

10. Theo R July 26th, 2008 at 1:15 am 10

    I love the pics! Recently found the site. Will be checking back often.

11. cjlatina July 26th, 2008 at 1:11 pm 11

    Umm she looks older than him. Someone like to rock the cradle.

12. impolite one July 26th, 2008 at 7:38 pm 12

    Maximus- I’ve no idea, as I’m a Korean man myself, just not from Korea. HAHA. I don’t bat for the other team either, so I’ve no idea if Korean guys impress in that way.

    Mainly, Korean guys in that college age group have taken to primping so they can impress girls, so they wear fashions that are kind of decided upon by women, in order to impress them. The average Korean guy is reasonably trendy and buys clothes seasonally, but doesn’t know any more about fashion than your average American guy, which is to say, nothing really. Seoul is just a small enough little cosm where they sell complete outfits ready to go at the markets, and everyone in Korea latches onto like one of three predetermined aesthetics. Mainstream post-couture watered down to jeans-based basic looks for normal builds, hip-hop inspired clothes for fat kids (this seems to be like a default look that won’t die, if you’re fat and Korean, you’re wearing a white tee and an NBA jersey) and then officewear/’jungjang’ looks for boring people. This kid falls straight into group #1, he has the Ann Demeulemeester-inspired waistcoat, the high contrast faded jeans which were hot and then dead a few years back, the chunky Rick Owens-inspired hightops, and the the little fedora that is trendite, a Japanese street trend from a couple years ago. He himself probably has no clue, he just bought it because that’s basically all there is at the shops. If this was 2 years ago, he might’ve been wearing a head-to-toe Dior Homme knockoff look, black shrunken peak lapel 1-button jacket, white shirt and skinny tie, maybe those ubiquitous skinny black jeans, and low-profile sneakers, etc, etc. In another year, it’ll all be colorblocked Raf Simons knockoff tops and boxy outers, huge chunky astronaut sneakers, and brightly colored skinny pants, or a weathered, structural gothic look made up of Rick Owens knockoffs.

    Where does it all come from? Honestly, as much as Koreans would never admit this even if they knew, the people who style these outfits to sell to kids, they just rip on Japanese magazine styled looks, like Mens Non No or Huge. Reason being that the Japanese put the creative work in, to style men’s looks to fit Asian physiognomies, using a combo of primarily European and domestic labels, and then the rest of Asia just apes it like a game of telephone and sells them as complete looks comprised of knockoffs. It’s glaringly obvious in all the online shopping malls in Korea that are called names like ‘Nippon coordi’ and ‘Tokyo Feel’ and then they use scans from Mens Non No to peddle their wares. The Korean ‘touch’ to all of this to make it their own, is usually to add some sort of visible branding to increase the status of the items. This is why the printed tee with the big logo on the front just won’t die in Korea.