I was just thinking about how I consider myself a mere fledgling goth even though I'm now in my mid-twenties and have been fascinated with the goth subculture since I was about eleven years old (thank you, Seattle Weekly, for doing an article on the goth scene!). This is because I have been in the closet, as it were, when it comes to wearing the obvious: black lace, corsets, boots that make my ears pop from elevation change when I climb into them, etc.

But I think that meanwhile I have been playing with other aspects of 'The Goth Aesthetic', like jewel tones, silky materials, flowing, romantic lines, eccentric pairings, things like that. It made me think that many of us fall victim to the stereotypes of the non-goth community (i.e. it's all about wearing black as opposed to something deeper) in order to recognize one another on the street. Not to mention that it is 90% attitude, and as Sarah Vowell expressed, you can wear pink and still exude doom and gloom.

So what are your less obvious choices/articles of clothing? Do you have a favourite colour to wear other than black? Have you successfully paired a fuzzy yellow duck purse with a spiked collar? How do you break the stereotype while still keeping the goth aesthetic?