SBY love ♥

If you're a regular reader of gyaru magazines, especially Egg and Popteen, then you're probably not a stranger to SBY. SBY is a gyaru goods store, all the stuff they sell is made with gyarus in mind ♥

A lot of gyaru/model-produced cosmetics are sold in SBY. Most of Diamond Beauty's new releases are usually exclusively sold at SBY first. They have 2 whole walls and a revolving stand just for Diamond Lash, so they're very well-stocked. Lots of gyaru models (especially Egg models) visit SBY, you'll often see pictures on the SBY 109 blog ♥

And the main store in Shibuya 109 is awesome. (SBY is an acronym for ShiBuYa^^) Located on the 8th floor, there's a cafe corner where you can order parfaits/drinks and just chill, and the best is the makeup/mirror corner where there's a huge row of gorgeous vanity tables, large mirrors plastered on the walls, curling irons/hair straighteners and various cosmetics just lying there for you to use freely ♥ At no cost. You can just walk into the store and go to that corner to do your makeup or your hair! You can even charge your phone there! The staff are really friendly and well-dressed too!

They also sell cute accessories and small goods like bags, charms, hats, stockings, hair accessories, pouches, earrings, necklaces, bracelets and wigs.

In Shibuya 109, SBY is right across WC, Wakatsuki Chinatsu's brand.

This is their uber cute shopping bag! Front side is blue with the words "Love me SBY", the other side is hot pink with white polka dots. Best of all, it's made from recycled material and can be used again~ ♥♥♥

There's also a bigger size that's pink on the front side (picture of Itabashi Rumi, EdgeStyle model, carrying it. From SBY 109 blog)

Inside the bag~ From the 109 store I got legwear, Melliesh blushes, Bibo eyebrow pencils, a mirror, hair accessories, cute rose-print ribbon earrings! ♥

Pink leopard-print bow with golden star studs.

It has a clip at the back, as well as an elastic band so it can be clipped on or used to tie a pony tail.

Heart-shaped mirror with purple leopard print and golden bow designs on the cover.

Melliesh blushes in 01 上品ローズ (Elegant Rose), 05 小顔ブラウン Small-face Brown and 06 クリアーラベンダー (Clear Lavender).

There's also a branch in Harajuku's Takeshita Doori, named SBY Happy Room, which just sells goods. The selection is smaller, but they pretty much have the same basic things. I went to the Harajuku store before I went to the 109 store.

This was the shopping bag~ Hot pink

Love the hot pink heart-shaped SBY sticker! It's actually translucent, the color shows up well because the bag is white.

Stuff I got from SBY Happy Room, cute cuddly pink bunny, Diamond Blushes, Candy Doll Makeup Base, Decolog who's Sweet lashes, a pretty makeup pouch! The pouch has a layer of chiffon on the top (paisley print!), it's thin enough for you to make out the round gold things in the layer underneath, so it looks really pretty (: The inside is gold and there's one inner pocket.

Bunny! Extremely soft, has a cellphone strap and chain on the bunny's back so you can hang her on your phone or on your bag~ ♥

Got the Diamond Beauty blushes in Gold Jewelry and Apricot Pink. Forgot to get Honey Orange :/ But...anyway I just received my Diamond Beauty Cream Cheeks (got all 4!) and Cream Shadows (01 and 02). The Cream Cheeks are awesome so I won't be needing Honey Orange for a while! Swatches of the lovely cream goodies will come soon~

SBY Website: http://sbys.jp/

SBY Shibuya 109

Shibuya 109 8F

Tel: 03-3477-5162

Opening hours: 10am~9pm

SBY Premium Shop Tenjin

Fukuoka Prefecture, Fukuoka City, Chuo District, Tenjin 1-11-11

Tenjin Core 7F

Tel: 092-712-5557

Opening hours: 11am~10pm

SBY 109 Abeno

Osaka Prefecture, Abeno District, Abeno-suji 1-6-1

Q's Mall Shibuya 109 Abeno 2F

Opening hours: 10am~9pm

(Despite it's misleading name, Shibuya 109 Abeno is nowhere near Shibuya in Tokyo, rather, it's located in Abeno which is in OSAKA!)

SBY Happy Room Harajuku

Shibuya District, Jingumae 1-20-11

(off Harajuku Takeshita Doori)

Tel: 03-6259-2258

Opening hours: 10am~7pm

SBY Happy Room OPA

Shinsaibashi OPA 6F

Tel: 06-6282-8036

Opening hours: 11am~9pm

Closed? It's not listed on the SBY site anymore.

竹下通り Takeshita Doori ♥

A little walk-through shopping guide to the stores on Takeshita Doori (竹下通り). Obviously these aren't all the stores along the street, but mainly the ones that I like, the ones that cater to gyaru and the more general everyone-can-find-something-they-like ones ♥

When you go out of Harajuku 原宿 station at the Takeshita Doori 竹下通り exit, you'll see this arch. The decor changes every now and then, but the street is the same. This is how it looks like on a lazy day, no crowds. One of the first things you'll see on the left is stairs going down to a Family Mart. People like to take shelter there when it rains ^^

This is my condensed map of Takeshita Doori, listed on it are the stores I like (: It's not all the stores, just the more general ones and ones catering to gyaru. Not exactly drawn to scale, but the I guarantee that the locations are quite accurate!

Brief description of the stores, starting from the right side of Takeshita Doori:

Family Mart: Convenience store

I love looking at all the drinks and desserts they have in convenience stores! Family Mart sells delicious mini choux puffs that come in packs of 10pcs for 150yen!

Lotteria, McDonalds: Fast food

Paris Kids: 315yen accessories store.

Lots of pretty hair accessories, necklaces, phone straps, earrings etc, all for 315yen.

Daiso: 105yen store

6 storeys I believe? Lots of different goods, all for 105yen.

大戸屋 (Ootoya): Japanese restaurant

Fancy Pocket (2F): Cheap hair accessories/school bag deco, by Sunhoseki

Conomi (1F): School uniform style clothes

SBY Happy Room: Gyaru store

Sells gyaru cosmetics, lashes, accessories, small goods, bags.

Main store is in Shibuya 109, which is amazing! This Harajuku store just sells goods, but the store in 109 has a little cafe where you'll often see highschool gyarus hanging around, and it also has a dolling-up station where they have curling irons/straigteners, makeup and big mirrors on the walls, you can sit there and use them all to doll yourself up. For free! The staff are really friendly too ♥

Claire's: Accessories

Angels Heart Crepes: Crepes

Marion Crepes: Crepes

(This is right beside the public toilets though!)

7-11: Convenience store

Liz Lisa: LIZ LISA!

Also has Tralala and the Chambre a coucher on the upper levels.

To be honest, I almost missed this cos the store name is in lights but the lights weren't on, and against the white wall background they were hardly visible. I only noticed it after seeing the red floor mat!

Aimer Feel: Lingerie

Left side of Takeshita Doori:

Yoshinoya: Beef bowls, really delish!

Mighty Soxer: Socks

Harada's: Gyaru clothes

Goodday House: Gyaru clothes

Momo: Gyaru clothes

Tutuanna: Hosiery, legwear.

Upper floor is lingerie.

Luceo: Gyaru clothes

ManiaQ: Fairy-kei clothes

MatsuKiyo: Drugstore

There's no Donki at Harajuku, so if you must get cosmetics you can try MatsuKiyo. They have shower stuff, sheet masks, loads of drugstore cosmetics like Majomajo, Kate, Integrate etc. They have lashes too! Luminous Change, Astrea V., Tsuji-chan, Dolly Wink, older Diamond Lash. However if you want gyaru/model-produced cosmetics go to SBY Happy Room!

Cafe Crepes: Crepes

ANAP: Clothes

Thank You Mart: 390yen store

Toko Kirakira: 500yen store

SoLaDo: A building.

Houses Pink Latte, Claire's, Wego (used clothing) and others.

Pink Latte: Pink, girly accessories, clothes and candy.

Lotteria: Fastfood

At the end of Takeshita Doori, turn right to Meiji Doori 明治通り:

Forever 21: American clothing store chain

The shopping bags are NEON PINK!

They also have the regular yellow ones, but the NEON PINK ones are so cool!

H&M: Swedish clothing store chain

Don't let that 799yen sign fool you. H&M is comparatively more expensive in Japan? It's more expensive than Forever21. Perhaps my comparison basis isn't fair because when I spammed H&M it was in Marseille and Barcelona during summer sales^^

ABC Mart: shoes

After ABC mart, around Laforet, right where there starts to be railings on the sidewalk, lots of magazine photographers/editors/staff or whatnot like to hang around? In the two times on two different days (a Thursday and a Saturday) that I walked by that exact same spot I was approached thrice. Exact same spot. And you can't really differentiate staff from regular peopl cos they're just...around and blend in? :/

Laforet: department store.

Houses many brands including Kitson and Swimmer, a cute small goods store.

At the intersection after Laforet, turn left for Omotesando, where all the luxury goods stores are, or turn right to go back to Harajuku station or to visit Meiji Jingu shrine. This is towards Harajuku Station.

Sembikiya, nice desserts!

Harajuku Station.

I really like this station, it's so pretty! ♥

I love Takeshita Doori. It does however cater to a younger crowd, but everyone can love the stuff they sell there!

Tutuanna* & hosiery ♥

The bottom floor of the Tutuanna* Pink Label store in Harajuku's Takeshita Doori.

The top floor is for lingerie and the exterior is entirely pink! The bottom floor houses a cornucopia of hosiery - socks, stockings, leggings, knee socks, footies, leg bands etc! You can't miss this store while strolling down Takeshita Doori!

Totally fell in love with this brand~ ( ´∀` )ﾉ ♥ It has many very wearable, feminine designs and is really affordable. Most items are 3 for 1,050yen unless otherwise stated. The quality is great, and it doesn't hurt that all the items are well-packaged.

Their shopping bag. Cute? (`･ω･´ )☆

I was in a mad rush to buy these on my last day in Tokyo. The first time I went to Takeshita Doori I passed it to go for lunch first, then forgot about going back after lunch T_T And on the last day I had almost no money left, and forgot to ask if I could pay by card as most shops didn't accept cards.

So I only got 6 items - 2 pairs of stockings, 1 pair of footies, 1 pairs of crew socks, 1 pairs of knee socks and a pair of bow leg bands. Tutuanna* is really filled with a lot of wonderful stuff, it's hard to go in and not get anything!

One of the pairs of stockings. In the package it looked black, but it was actually gray (my fault for not checking the labels) but it's actually a pretty color. I love the design! ♥

Footies ♥ I had wanted to get more, but no $$$. There were lots of other pretty designs! Anyway I totally love that these are made of lace and have floral prints ♥ And the front part is padded at the sole, isn't that great? most of the footies I've seen selling in Singapore aren't padded, and cost more than Tutuanna*.

Knee socks and the bow leg bands.

I wanted to get the knee socks in peach too! They were a nice color.

Feeling major regret not getting more legwear from Tutuanna!! All their hosiery and legwear are majorly pretty, packaged well and are very well-made! Prices are nice too. I had a hard time narrowing my picks to just 6. Sadly the website/online store does not stock all the products, the physical shop has soooo much more. The tutuanna* site is http://www.tutuanna.co.jp.

Got footies and leggings/stockings from the SBY Shibuya 109 store. Bought these before Tutuanna, so this was before I knew such pretty footies existed in Tutuanna, thus they're rather plain in comparison (´Д` )

S-leg leggings/stockings, produced by Masuwaka Tsubasa. I totally had no idea she produced legwear too. I have to admit, that I only spotted these because I saw Tsubasa's face plastered on them.

These were 819yen/pair. These were the only designs I saw in the store. The blue check was the last piece, and the stripey one was available in black/blue and black/yellow as well. The one I got was black/pink.

The blue checked stockings.

They're actually really pretty! The clear part is really just holes, because this pair is made from knit or something. So I'm glad they're holes and not an extra layer of nylon because the knit makes it EXTREMELY warm. Even after 2 minutes my legs were heating up. I don't know if I can take it wearing these in such warm weather.

Mehehe, the day after buying S-leg from SBY, I bought the latest issue of PopSister, and saw this ad amongst the front few pages. Hahaha. Apparently there are crew socks and knee socks as well, but I didn't spot any at SBY 109 or SBY Happy Room (´Д` )

S-leg is sold at Shimamura, online, SBY Shibuya 109, SBY Happy Room (Harajuku in Tokyo and OPA in Osaka). Their website is http://s-leg.jp.

Comparing the two brands, I feel that the items from Tutuanna* are more well-made, have nicer designs and are better-priced as well. I liked the packaging more too. S-leg's selling point is probably just Tsubasa's face. But it is relatively new, so we'll just have to wait and see what else they'll come up with (:

Seriously, Singapore does not sell any cute/pretty legwear with quality like these anywhere.