Quick retail visit with 10 minutes to spare before a fascinating expert interview in a Meguro kissaten, and spotted this wonderful artifact that mixes the cultural (bowing or bending), with the behavioural (bowing, humans have a tendency to check out each other’s butts especially when a person bending), with the aspirational (the size and shape of the butt). The untrained eye might also assume there’s an element of S&M in its design, tho I can assure you dear reader its in the eye of the beholder.

When retail dummy designs are life-like, they tend to match the cultural aspirations of the day – whether this bending design (spotted here for the first time) or the big-butt fetish of Brazilian counterparts.