INTERVIEWER: What do you think of it?
MAN: I think it’s cool.
MAN: She looks like a little porcelain doll. innit?
JADE SMITH: My name is Jade. I am a real life doll and online I am known as Jadette. I origamied
the roses myself. The Cinderella spins around in them. This hair is my 6-meter long
Rapunzel wig. When I was 11 I got really interested in to the Japanese anime scene and I started
cosplaying and at my first ever convention I discovered Lolita fashion and from then on
it’s just grown in to what it is now.
JADE SMITH: Lolita is based on the fashion sub-style from the 80s from Japan.
JADE SMITH: This was my dream dress. I first saw this dress when I was 11 years old and
I just recently finally got my hands on it, as it’s a really rare print. I wear this
outfit pretty much everyday when I am not at work obviously. The only causal clothing
I own is jeggings, which I do wear for work. I don’t own any trainers at all. I have
never actually worn trainers out since the late 90s.
JADE SMITH: My routine varies. It can take me up to 4 to 6 hours to get ready depending
on what I am wearing.
JADE SMITH: I will mainly wake up, put my lenses in, put my lashes on, put my makeup on. Then either if
I am wearing a wig, I will put wig on or I will style my hair and then I have to pick my
outfit and then add all my glitter and all my sequins and all my diamantes and then I am done.
JADE SMITH: I think roughly I have spent around £10,000 just on my clothes alone.
JADE SMITH: The Cinderella cost around £400 to make. It has taken me a whole week
to make my Cinderella and that involved hand sticking individually 4,000 diamantes and
this is just the top skirt and top bodice of it. It has 14 other petticoats and a hoop
skirt to hold it up. And I have to be sewn in to this because nothing will hold it shut.
JADE SMITH: My friends really adore my fashion but my family are, kind of, iffy about but
they just accept me for who I am now.
SIOBHAN HILL: The first time I saw you without your wig on and I was like, ‘who the hell is this?
Who is this person with ginger hair? Not blonde.’ Because I thought you were blonde for so long.
I didn’t realise it was a wig.
SIOBHAN HILL: And every time I see Jade, she always looks different. You don’t care what
people think to the point where you go, "I think it’s cute. I am going to wear it.
Everyone else be damned. I look fabulous." And you walk in to a room and everyone goes,
‘Oh!’ which is pretty much true because I have seen a lot of envious looks your way.
JADE SMITH: The reaction I get in public is often varied. Sometimes I get nice compliments
and other times I get shouted at. The latest one was when I was called Little Bo Peep
when I was walking down the street the other day. Quite a few people always try to take
photos of me sneakily or they do ask for photos sometimes.
MAN: What’s your story?
JADE SMITH: Oh, this is just what I wear normally.
MAN: Is it?
JADE SMITH: Yeah.
MAN: Everyday?
JADE SMITH: Everyday, yeah.
MAN: That’s cool.
INTERVIEWER: What do you think of it?
MAN: I think it’s cool.
MAN: She looks like a little porcelain doll. innit?
JADE SMITH: I suffer from a condition called Fibromyalgia. It’s basically like arthritis
but it affects my entire body, all my muscles, all my joints and it’s incredibly painful
to live through each day.
JADE SMITH: It affects me because I can’t enjoy as many things as I wish I could. There
are some days where I am just bed bound where I can’t actually move. The toys and the
clothes do help with it because if it makes me forget for even just a little while the pain that
I am experiencing.
JADE SMITH: All my life I was bullied. I had no friends at all. This is like the one fashion
that I feel comfortable in. It’s not considered normal. But people who also do wear this,
they are like a pack, they keep you together and they always make sure that you are okay no
matter what.
JADE SMITH: I believe this is the real me because of inside I am cute and I am cuddly
and I just like to project it to the world.