where exactly is the line between “cosplay” and “just dressing like that?” i feel like when i see cosplay in an unconventional place (the mall, for example) the biggest tell that it’s not just An Elaborate Outfit is material quality. it’s rare i see people in the Good Shit. so if you want to dress like a touhou character or whatever without it looking like a costume does that necessitate making all your own clothes? much to think about. i have to wake up early for a flight tomorrow.
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in reply to @jkap's post:
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costume is when you dress as a character
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cosplay is when you dress and act as a character
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roleplay is when you dress and act as a character with others within a planned scenario
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fashion is when you are dressed as yourself
This is it, chief. Though the notion of "casual cosplay" or "closet cosplay" blurs the lines a little. It's all a form of creative expression either way.
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cosplay = costume + roleplay
doesnt really matter how a subculture decides to borrow the word; it's got a simple origin with a logical meaning
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I think context will make anything after a certain threshold look like a costume, but fabric choice does go a long way. I think for something like Touhou you could probably buy actual clothes and coordinate them in a way that it looks like the characters (I definitely had a shirt like Remi’s growing up because I dressed like an old lady)
I do feel that a lot of the “costume” perception is based off of both material quality and character recognition. There’s probably more leniency with material quality when nobody recognizes the character you’re emulating, and more need to apply clothing design principles for something more embedded in the social conscious.
I don’t know a lot about touhou specifically but the precursory google search makes me feel like you could probably find those clothing items moderately easily online and it wouldn’t come off as costume like in public. Less socially common, but it’s like less elaborate and aggressively petticoated classics Lolita fashion.
I'm a big fan of cosplay that only I know about, like I'm wearing the same outfit as a film/tv character and it just looks like normal clothes and only if someone had a really keen eye would they even notice. idk its something weird i do
I agree with Renpona in that there's no need to have a line between those two things, buuut if you wanna be fully technical...
I think it has more of a contextual line to it. If the person is aiming to do something elaborate while wearing the cosplay and then take it off once it's over, it's definitely cosplay. Y'know, attending a convention, making some sort of content with it, etc. If they're just wearing it with the same mindset of me or you wearing a casual tee in summer, then they're just dressing like that.