If you’re interested in current Japanese youth fashion, an upbeat trendy store like WEGO will give you a good idea. For women especially, there is a stricter expectation of what feminine colors and clothing you should wear during each season because all the clothing shops in the mall tend to sell similar items. Although I did find some of the clothing cute, I was always concerned about the sizing standards in Japan. Clothing in Japan is made to fit the average Japanese silhouette, which tends to be thin, so even if you shop at Western stores like H&M, Zara, and Bershka, their clothing lines seem to be small compared to American sizes. For example, I wear a size 8 in U.S. women’s shoes, which is considered average in America, but in Japan it is a size “LL”, double-L or extra large, so it was difficult to find Japanese shoe brands with my size.
In addition to my immediate neighborhood, I also explored the several cities around the greater Shinjuku, Shibuya, and Harajuku area. Here’s a list of cities I visited, from cities north to south of Shinjuku:
