Water Lilies

Confession time: I love CLAMP.

I discovered the world of Japanese comics and animation in early to mid 2000's - the time when the CLAMP ladies were at the peek of their popularity. I devoured "RG Veda", "Tokyo Babylon" and "X", rejoicing in every single page I read or episode I downloaded (and I still think Yoshiaki Kawajiri's take on "X" the TV series is the best thing he's ever made). I fell for their style pretty bad: a mixture of cuteness, sexiness, quirky humor and spectacularly cheesy melodrama, combined with a most brutal penchant for violence, tragedy, cruel plot twists and the unhappiest of unhappy endings. And they made it all look beautiful, these ladies, with a unique mixture of Japanese traditional aesthetics and Art Nouveau design.

Nowadays, however, the anime and manga trends have changed, some other narrative tropes have become more popular than CLAMP's violent melodrama, and the ladies have somewhat fallen out of favor with the new generation of fans. Their latest works coming out as duds and stopping after only a few chapters did not help either.

Which basically leaves "xxxHOLiC" - the chronicles of the wish-granting witch and her entourage, whose story happily balances between hysterical humor and misanthropic cynicism, obviously written by middle-aged authors who are well aware they're losing both their popularity and their faith in humanity - as CLAMP's last major project.

For now, at least. One can always hope.

Credits:

Kimono dress designed by Mistiqarts​, made by Ana Barajević and Marina Anđelković
Kiseru pipe by Endymion Craftsmanship & Cosplay​
Makeup by Ljubica Mirkovic Make up Artist​
Special thanks to Wacky Cherry​ for arranging the %$#&!! wig to look this awesome on the floor.

Photo by Aleksandar Jovković for Marшal foto studio​ edited by Tenshi-CosplayArts