When Kristina Elle, better known on the internet as cybr.grl, walks in, her colorful attire and cheerful demeanor brightens up the room. Dressed head to toe in an array of rainbow accessories and clothing, her outfit always seems to offer something new to focus on the longer you look. Elle shares that she often gets asked about her favorite color, to which her answer remains the same: rainbow. While some may say that’s not one color, her answer makes more sense when you hear her approach to styling.
Decora is a Japanese alternative fashion style characterized by a kawaii aesthetic, vibrant colors, and accessories and layers to the max. It’s a style in which there’s no such thing as too much. Of all the many components to today’s outfit, Elle points out a bead necklace with a large Hello Kitty pendant. “I actually just got this after a panel that just happened,” she says. “A really cute kid came up to me with her dad, and he was telling me all about how he helped her make this necklace. It was really sweet.”
To Elle, it is a meticulous process to put together a completed look, but it’s one full of joy. Despite the time it takes, she prefers to plan her outfits the day-of rather than the night before, so she can be spontaneous and dress according to her mood. The process of creating a look is like reflecting on how you feel or how you want to feel and embodying that into a physical outfit. “That’s the fun part of it all, building the whole look. It’s like completing a puzzle,” she starts. “You’re picking and choosing all the little parts, but when you’re done with the whole picture, it makes you feel really happy afterwards.” In other words, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and that’s why rainbow is her favorite color.
To Elle, it is a meticulous process to put together a completed look, but it’s one full of joy. Despite the time it takes, she prefers to plan her outfits the day-of rather than the night before, so she can be spontaneous and dress according to her mood. The process of creating a look is like reflecting on how you feel or how you want to feel and embodying that into a physical outfit. “That’s the fun part of it all, building the whole look. It’s like completing a puzzle,” she starts. “You’re picking and choosing all the little parts, but when you’re done with the whole picture, it makes you feel really happy afterwards.” In other words, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, and that’s why rainbow is her favorite color.
Elle’s content creation journey started long before she was on YouTube, making home videos with her friends. Once she experimented more with subculture fashion and the platform grew more popular, becoming a YouTuber was a natural move for Elle: “There’s so many ways to be involved in fashion, like not just being a designer or stylist. I found that making YouTube videos is another way I could get involved, and I thought it was so cool that you get to just create things with your own ideas.”
2020, the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, was when Elle’s YouTube channel began taking off. She shares, “Even though there were a lot of terrible things happening, we were able to find a lot of connections online, which was really amazing.” As a Japanese subculture fashion enthusiast, the internet was particularly important during that time to finding and building community and exercising self-expression to a crowd that just understood. “It’s been cool to interact with the worldwide community, like people in South America, Asia, and Europe, and see how different people style their outfits and make their own accessories,” she says with a smile. “It’s a very energizing style, so it’s really nice to just brighten somebody else’s day with your fashion.”
In addition to creating videos about decora and Japanese alternative fashion, Elle also started her own fashion business: CANDY☆TRAP. “I was having a hard time trying to find clothes for older people because a lot of really colorful clothes and accessories usually come from stores like Claire’s, and they’re a lot smaller. So if I can’t find it, I figured I can just make it.” This idea struck her while she was attending college for fashion marketing. However, it became really challenging to balance school, parenting, and starting a business. “I had to make the hard decision of quitting school and taking a leap of faith into my business, but I’m so glad it was the right choice for me. There are just some things you don’t know you can do unless you try.”
Now over 10 years into adopting the decora lifestyle and becoming an influential figure in the community, Elle finds herself attending conventions not as an attendee, but as a guest. “It’s so surreal to think about how there are people I look up to as my fashion inspiration, and now I attend an event like Fanime, and some people come up to me and I’m that person to them. It’s such an honor.” She continues, “Sometimes it can be kind of hard to keep doing all this because there are people in your life or people online who frown at the way you dress. But meeting people who enjoy this fashion as much as I do really helps keep me going and reminds me why I love it.”
On advice to others who want to follow a similar path, Elle simply says, “Don’t compare yourself to others and focus on what makes you different. Take your time to figure out what you’re passionate about, and just let yourself grow.”
