while big companies, going from DH (AKB48) to WACK or even Dearstage, have in-house designers to produce costumes for the members of their groups the reality is that smaller companies and independent artists don't have the funds to hire talent full time to produce outfits just for them
the thing is that the idol scene is super competitive so how are smaller groups supposed to not only get the attention of the public but also compete with the most popular names of scene when a simple glance can make clear the difference in resources between the two?
enter Fille Lilas, "fille" is a French word referring to a young girl while "lilas" refers to the lilac flower that symbolizes innocent love, the name was inspired by the saying "リラの咲く頃" or "when the lilac blooms", the company started back in 2013 and initially specialized in making costumes and dresses for parties or events and aimed at young women but eventually idol groups got a word of them and resulted in a partnership that to this day is still in full bloom
if i were to give you a full list of all the groups they had worked with if probably would be more than 100+ names long, i want to put emphasis in that all their uniforms are made on request by their clients, i want to explain a little more what is going on behind the scenes but first let me share some of their most recent uniforms produced in the past months, all these groups are part of different agencies
one of the charms of Fille Lilas is that they aren't mass producing countless outfits and then asking clients to pick from a catalog but instead all their clothes are produced from the specifications of their client, "Cinderella Sengen!" has hired them to produce all their uniforms so far and in part is also thanks to Cinderella Sengen! that FL has become a little more mainstream so i think they are the perfect example
the company post regular updates of the uniforms they are making so you can follow the whole process from when they were requested until they were delivered
all uniforms are customized to the preferences of the person, for example "what type of cut you like for you dress", "want kind of accessories you want", etc i think it's pretty interesting
although it seems that many people in Japan still aren't aware of them so if you read until here you probably already have more insight into the production of uniforms in the Jpop scene that even some entertainment companies
honestly i think it's really cool that thanks to them now even smaller, newer groups also have access to cute high quality uniforms that have nothing to envy to those of the most popular idol groups
