Gwen Stefani for Allure: 'My God, I'm Japanese'"

[Neydelinska Spearsi]

''Fourteen years after the debut of her Harajuku Lovers fragrance collection, we asked Gwen Stefani about the praise, the backlash, and the lessons she’s brought into her most recent beauty venture. What she said stunned us.''

 

 

Gwen Stefani has been many people over the last two decades. There's pop-punk Stefani with baby blue hair and bindis. Ska-era Stefani with platinum blonde hair, a bikini top, and cargo pants. And Harajuku Stefani, who we'll get to in a minute. (If you want to review all of these personas at once, they came together in the 2021 music video for her single "Let Me Reintroduce Myself.") 

 

The last year ushered in another phase of Stefani’s career with the launch of GXVE Beauty, a vegan line that features her signature red lip color (along with her platinum hair, it's one of the only near constants in her aesthetic history) and a few other beauty staples, such as shadow palettes and gel eyeliners.

 

 

GXVE isn’t Stefani’s first beauty brand, though. Before that, there was Harajuku Lovers. The fragrance line launched in 2008, four years after the release of her solo album Love.Angel.Music.Baby., which took inspiration from Japan’s Harajuku subculture for its visuals and marketing (and subsequently Stefani’s own personal style). The fragrance collection included five scents and each was housed in a bottle shaped like a doll caricatured to look like Stefani and her four "Harajuku Girls," the Japanese and Japanese American backup dancers she employed and named Love, Angel, Music, and Baby for the promotion of her album. The perfumes gained industry recognition, winning The Fragrance Foundation’s Fragrance of the Year Award in 2009, and spawned generations of flankers. Magazines (Allure included) covered them extensively. Meanwhile, I, a first-generation Filipina American teen in New Jersey, starving for Asian representation in pop culture, begged my mom for the "Love" fragrance. She consistently responded with a hard no, always pointing to its price tag: $45 for one ounce of perfume at Macy’s. 

 

 

In recent years, the "L.A.M.B" universe, along with some of Stefani’s other projects, has been the subject of many conversations surrounding cultural appropriation. So when I recently sat down to interview Stefani at an event celebrating GXVE’s latest collection, I asked her about her new brand’s mission — "I wanted to create a community of makeup lovers like me" — and what went into its newest products, which include lipsticks that are a departure from her signature red: "We all have different color skin and all have different things that we wear different colors for." But I also included a question about what she felt she may have learned from Harajuku Lovers — considering its praise, backlash, and everything in between. She responded by telling me a story she’s shared with the press before about her father’s job at Yamaha, which had him traveling between their home in California and Japan for 18 years. 

"That was my Japanese influence and that was a culture that was so rich with tradition, yet so futuristic [with] so much attention to art and detail and discipline and it was fascinating to me," she said, explaining how her father (who is Italian American) would return with stories of street performers cosplaying as Elvis and stylish women with colorful hair. Then, as an adult, she was able to travel to Harajuku to see them herself. "I said, 'My God, I'm Japanese and I didn't know it.'" As those words seemed to hang in the air between us, she continued, "I am, you know." She then explained that there is "innocence" to her relationship with Japanese culture, referring to herself as a "super fan." 

"If [people are] going to criticize me for being a fan of something beautiful and sharing that, then I just think that doesn't feel right," she told me. "I think it was a beautiful time of creativity… a time of the ping-pong match between Harajuku culture and American culture." She elaborated further: "[It] should be okay to be inspired by other cultures because if we're not allowed then that's dividing people, right?" 

 

ARTICLE:

Gwen Stefani: "I Said, 'My God, I’m Japanese'" | Allure

WWW.ALLURE.COM

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Fourteen years after the launch of Harajuku Lovers, Gwen Stefani offers her unfiltered thoughts.

 

Edited January 10, 2023 by Neydelinska Spearsi

[Neydelinska Spearsi]

Gwen Stefani Fuels Controversy After Saying 'I'm Japanese' While Addressing Cultural Appropriation

PEOPLE.COM

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Gwen Stefani sparked controversy after saying "I'm Japanese" while addressing cultural appropriation in an interview with Allure Magazine.

 

[Stefani]

P!nk, Gwen and Ariana being the cultural appropriation trinity.

[Kaitlyn Johnson]

I think they’re twisting her words for a narrative. They interviewed her for 32 minutes and used only a few quotes. The world is so uptight right now. 

Edited January 11, 2023 by Kaitlyn Johnson

[TTrouble]

Everyone gets offended but the japanese 

[Bo da toe]

 

[britney_rocks]

The funny thing is being offended by **** like this is such an American thing. Nobody else around the world gives a **** about cultural appropriation. Americans need to ******* chill. These videos are a great example of it.

 

 

Edited January 11, 2023 by britney_rocks

[Neydelinska Spearsi]

Not going to lie- I always wanted those Harajuku dolls/perfumes. I don't give a **** what Americans think. They are so gorgeous.

 

[Sia]

Seriously…of all the things she said you hang on to ONE sentence and even then you post it out of context.

She didn’t say she’s literally Japanese, she said it to emphasize her love and appreciation for the culture.

My God…stuff like this makes me realize why the liberal agenda is starting to fail.

[aoki.loid]

7 hours ago, Neydelinska Spearsi said:

Not going to lie- I always wanted those Harajuku dolls/perfumes. I don't give a **** what Americans think. They are so gorgeous.

 

i want 1 2 

[jordeezy river red]

Why are Americans so offended by multiculturalism? Save your faux- outrage. 

[icybaby]

I agree no1 cares about it. She was inspired by it. People get offended by anything these days.

[fays1]

Appreciating other cultures is a good thing, and Gwen is a great example of that

They also took her out of context on purpose

[TTrouble]

Are we agreeing on something? On Exhale? 

Everybody is healing I quess.

[bas che]

Lol imagine being a nobody attempting to smear Gwen’s reputation and cancel her amazing legacy. Journalism at its finest.  

[Neydelinska Spearsi]

8 minutes ago, bas che said:

Lol imagine being a nobody attempting to smear Gwen’s reputation and cancel her amazing legacy. Journalism at its finest.  

 

Gwen can smear sushi on my face and I'll still be hyped and say kawaii