Harajuku Chicago Kyoto Store — Local services in Kyoto

I cannot describe how wonderful the female staff were. Instead of going into one of those snobby tourist trap yukata/kimono rentals, go here! I was so annoyed and discouraged by the way rentals treat tourists as if you’re going into some posh place for a lousy 4000-5000 yen. It felt like going into a luxury store and being looked down on. So we decided to go to a thrift store and buy a yukata (out of season perhaps but it was very hot we couldn’t survive in kimonos). The first female worker helped us pick out everything we needed. We went home and decided to wear them next morning. We had so much trouble putting them on though, we felt a bit awkward but decided to go back and see if they can help us, we were willing to pay. The other female worker helped us, no questions asked. She made us fit perfectly and our belts remained intact the whole day! She was very happy to help and did it for free, declining our offer for compensation for her trouble. In hindsight, I would buy the yukata on the day I planned to wear it, to avoid troubling the staff. We did our very best to put it on ourselves but it was too hard 😅

Definitely go here instead of a rental, staff is amazing and helpful! And you get to...

It has a pretty wide variety of kimonos and yukatas and haoris and more. But i really thought that because it was secondhand, it would be a lot cheaper. But prices for haori were well over 3,000 yen and more than 2,000yen even for bad quality ones with small stains or holes. They're all marked with labels so dig around for the price tags if you want to see how much it is. There is a small section for geta and handbags in the corner. But they have a pretty wide range of things for the entire kimono attire... though the price is pricier than i thought it would be. The kimonos are on the second floor. There are some on display outside. Those are the cheaper ones... but there isn't a wide variety of those. The place itself isn't too hard to find, and there weren't very many people in the district...

Super cool thrift store in Kyoto. In the basement, they have your regular thrift store clothing, but in the level above, they have all things secondhand kimonos/yakutas, etc. There are prices for every buyer, so you can go expensive or you can go as cheap as something like $13 I think. I got a kimono, a yakuta, and four obis for $126, which is an absolute steal considering what you rent kimonos for. The only caveat is that they don't really have sizes for bigger people (or rather, wider people). It seems that you have to be somewhat skinny to have the kimono/yakuta close. However, there are other clothing options that are more inclusive and can hang open as a sort of cardigan thing.

Overall, I really liked this thrift shop and highly recommend it for your budget...