Welcome to episode four in BoingBoing's crash course on the global cybercartoon fetish pantheon. So, apparently, there's a difference between Kigurimi and cosplay: masks. Fleshbot and BoingBoing reader Sarmoung says:
There's a certain blurring between the two types of dressing up in Japan, but there are certain distinctions. Cosplay is almost always mask free and draws on various video game, manga and anime characters. This is more fantastic in look generally. The majority of cosplayers in Japan aren't too happy about its infiltration into the hardcore adult market, but there's no denying its clear debt/links to the fetish scene. There's a book out in English called "Cosplay Girls" and you can find a fair amount of adult (and non-adult) cosplay related material via J-List. Nao Oikawa has done a fair amount of this adult cosplay work.
The use of masks makes it kigurumi. These are in origin the same as people in Goofy outfits of whatever at Disneyland. You seem them frequently enough at amusement parks in Japan or doing product promotions in the street. These are also generally drawn from the manga/anime/game world. Now some people do this for a living and some do it as a hobby. Obviously it's a step beyond as these people tend to wear full skin-toned body stockings, unitards and whatever in addition to the masks. Also, you suspect that many of the hobbyists are men although this isn't always the case. It's just impossible to tell, although the hands do give it away much of the time.
What you then discover is that kigurumi is further subdivided between people who wear manga styled masks and costumes (pointy chins, huge eyes, etc) and those who go for a ultra-realist look, where the costumes become much more everyday. This then sort of leads on to Japanese ultrarealist love dolls.
Link to "What is Kigurimi?", Links to very strange adult kigurimi: Room 107, Room 108, from dollhouse.jp. (Thanks, fleshbot.)
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