School Sport Uniform

Part of the trinity of Japanese school fashion including the Sailor Fuku and the School Swimsuit is the school sport uniform (otherwise just called gym clothes, and commonly referred to as just bloomers or buruma for their high-legged shorts), a staple in many Anime, Manga and Video Games. The design consists of two pieces: a short-sleeved white shirt and (depending on if the wearer is female or male) legless briefs or shorts, respectively. The latter are typically dark blue or red, and the colour also usually appears as stripes at the ends of the sleeves on the shirt and/or around the neck. Sometimes a nametag of the wearer is added to the chest as well.

Like the other two, wearing a school sport uniform can be done for the obvious purpose of doing sports (at school or otherwise) or sometimes a modest form of Fanservice. It also invokes a feeling of nostalgia much like the other two about the times during high school. Plus it's Moe if worn by a cute girl. It can also show a character to be competitive, like during a school sport festival, especially if the character also dons a Martial Arts Headband.

It should be noted that in Real Life, bloomers are considered very old-fashioned — they were phased out starting in the mid-'90s because of modesty concerns for female students, with the standard gym shorts becoming unisex. However, the image persists in modern-day Japanese media, because the artists are adults drawing on their own memories of high school (and its pop culture depictions).

Gym bloomers were once popular in the United States. A trope Older Than Television, bloomers were often referenced for humour as the term could refer to a women's athletic shorts or women's underwear. Athletic bloomers waned in popularity in the 1930's. However in many areas of the United States, girl's gym uniforms utilized bloomers until the end of The '50s.

School Sport Uniforms, much like School Swimsuits, are also often a form of clothing reward in Video Games, like Role Playing Games or Beat Em Ups.

Also see Joshikousei, who usually wear this, and Leg Focus, since the briefs give strong emphasis to the wearer's legs.

---

Examples:

Anime and Manga

• In general, this outfit will appear in just about any school series set in Japan (and sometimes even somewhere else) when physical activities are involved because, much like the traditional School Swimsuit, of its sheer iconic value and cute, simple elegance.
• Volleyball-focused shows Attack No. 1 and Attacker You! have just about all the girls who play the sport wear the shirt-and-bloomers version.
• Azumanga Daioh has the typical shorts for guys and bloomers for girls. Kimura has a particular interest in the bloomers, and even asks the girls to tuck their shirts into their bloomers, much to their disgust. Their outdatedness is lampshaded by Yomi near the end of the manga (which began serialization in 1999, when they were already being phased out of schools), to which Kimura insists that "bloomers will never die".
• Bloomer Blue Maniacs: As the name suggests, this outfit is worn; specifically, the protagonist Chiihaya sees a girl in bloomers pass by her, which gets her attention, so she begins the search for her "Bloomer Girl".
• In the spin-off universe of "Demon Slayer Kimetsuno Yaiba", females of the Kimetsu Academy wore a P.E uniform consisting of a white school T-shirt over red bloomers with one white stripe line.
• In the second episode of Good Luck Girl!, Ichiko Sakura's exorcist "outfit" turns out to be a white school T-shirt over red bloomers, just... because. The character herself even lampshades it, in-universe.
• Used in Haruhi Suzumiya, mainly in the first episode of the anime, when Taniguchi spends the P.E. period ogling the girls in gym uniforms. Their briefs, in particular.
• The Irregular at Magic High School: Erika Chiba wears this during one episode but comments are made that it's a severely outdated style not commonly worn anymore.
• Nanoka and her friends are shown wearing these in Koi Kaze. Notably, this doesn't appear to be fanservice, but instead serves as one of the details that date the timeframe of this series to the nineties.
• Love, Chunibyo & Other Delusions!: Rikka Takanashi wears this during the Christmas Episode on the suggestion of Shinka Nibutani who in turn heard it from Touka Takanashi because the latter claims that Rikka's boyfriend, Yuuta Togashi, would really like it.
• The anime adaptation of My Mental Choices Are... features Ouka Yuuouji and Konagi Yawakaze wrestling each other while wearing Japanese bloomers, in a scene played entirely for fanservice reasons.
• The Beauty in Erika's Gym is shown to be wearing one in Pokémon Origins during a summary sequence which features Red battling Erika.
• Puella Magi Madoka Magica has them as part of Homura's "awesomeness montage" in the first episode, and again much later, in a flashback where she's considerably less good at everything. This includes a mild fanservice shot of her doing a high-jump in slow motion, which might be why the whole segment was cut from the Compilation Movie.
• The anime adaptation of "The Eminencein Shadow", season 2 episode 3, features Claire waking up in her subconscious in a school infirmary wearing the Japanese gym uniform consisting of a white school T-shirt over red bloomers shorts. Other than being used for fanservice reasons but also the school environment in the dream setting was likely lifted by Aurora from some connection to Cid.
• Sekirei: Despite not attending school whatsoever, Musubi is often seen wearing one at the Izumo Inn, either as sleepwear or when she's out sparring in the courtyard.
• Uzaki-chan Wants to Hang Out!: When her husband is going through a funk in Chapter 79, Tsuki Uzaki dresses up in a school sport uniform to cheer him up.

Comic Books

• Robin: Despite being a school in New Jersey all Gotham Heights High students are required to wear this, a uniform white t-shirt shirt with maroon shorts for P.E. classes.

Fan Works

• Like with everything else, the girls of Gensokyo are often drawn in fan art or Fan Vids wearing School Sport Uniforms. This is especially prevalent with the more "close-combat" oriented characters, such as Hong Meiling, Youmu Konpaku, Yuugi Hoshiguma or Byakuren Hijiri, but certainly not exclusive.
  • Then there is the artist/musician WINN, who made a whole series of fan art and videos of the girls playing an Electronic Wind Instrument while wearing a School Swimsuit, while their "opponents" often go for the School Sport Uniform as contrast.

Film - Live Action

• The main cast wears bloomers constantly in the Japanese film Give It All, released in 1998 but set in the 70s.

Literature

• In Gonna Be the Twin-Tail!!, there is a high school which is one of the few high schools that still use the older kind of gym uniform, which gets attacked by an Ultimaguil called Turtle Guildy.
• Used in Highschool DXD by the female members the Occult Research club (much to Issei's joy) in the dodgeball match against the Student Council, another group who have a rivalry with the research club.

Live Action Television

• Girl's school athletic uniforms, complete with bloomers, make a few appearances on Our Miss Brooks. Truth in Television, as bloomers were still worn by girls in many parts of the United States until the mid-1950's.
  • In "Baseball Slide", Miss Brooks borrows Mrs. Davis' bloomers when she's the substitute coach of the girl's softball team. The girls have to shield Miss Brooks; Connie slides into home plate and wrecks the seat of the bloomers in the process.
  • "Turnabout Day" sees Mr. Boynton forced to coach the girl's volleyball team. He appears in Mr. Conklin's office (reluctantly) wearing a blouse and bloomers. This is much to the amusement of Miss Brooks.
  • "Dress Code Protest", a radio episode, has Miss Brooks tear her skirt on her badly splintered desk. She is forced to borrow Harriet Conklin's gym bloomers from the cloakroom. Stretch Snodgrass bursts into laughter upon seeing her.

Video Games

• Konoha from Arcana Heart wears an outfit what is a school sport uniform mixed alongside with ninja accessories.
• Ryuuko from the school sports-themed fighting game Asuka 120% wears a red buruma with her school t-shirt as her outfit.
• Dead or Alive: Kasumi, Ayane, Hitomi and others can win a shirt and bloomers costume in several games or get it via DLC. Being a fighting game series you can expect good looks at their legs.
• Disgaea RPG: The "Evil Academy Fest-evil of Sport" event features a sub-plot of Raspberyl, Fuka and Ayame (whom are all wearing these as part of the dress code) attempting to try and get the uniform abolished, whilst facing opposition from other characters.
• Elsword provides a few:
  • Aisha, Ara and Eve can equip the classic combination of white T-shirt and bloomers, while Rena adds a jacket to her ensemble.
  • Elsword goes with the typical male version, in other words gym shorts, Chung dons the female version since it's cuter and Raven goes for the PE teacher look (trousers, jacket, kendo stick).
• Ensemble Stars! features a traditional version involving a white t-shirt and red shorts. Being an idol school, it also has a specific uniform for idol activities, which involves a white v-necked t-shirt, a blue jacket with some gold trim, a grey belt, and grey pants.
• Kaoru Konoe from Gate Keepers, being a highly-atheletic tomboy who's in a track team, wears navy-blue buruma 24/7, either in combat mode or in civilian mode, to the point where the only episode she's not seen in the standard Japanese bloomers is the Beach Episode. The anime adaptation also have a sports festival episode with all the girls wearing buruma.
• Pangya: The "Passionate Training Set" is available for multiple characters which consists of a jacket, the bloomers and additional items like shoes. The set changes some animations like shots or the Idle Animation in the lounge.
• Ai Momoyama, the protagonist of the obscure PlayStation fighting game Pretty Fighter (set in a school) wears a blue buruma as her default outfit.
• Prism Court for the PlayStation is a volleyball-themed sports game where every character wears red bloomers over white sports shirts. Both during gameplay and the opening cinematics.
• Rival Schools: As captain of Gorin High's volleyball team, Natsu Ayuhara fights in her team uniform, which consists of a jersey, knee pads, and bloomers◊. So you get to see plenty of leg and a bit of her behind during her fights. In the sequel ("Project Justice"), she switches to a regular pair of gym shorts.
• Senran Kagura has this as a costume you can get in some of the games. Additionally, Hibari's Shinobi outfit is essentially the typical anime gym uniform, though she also wears a track jacket.
• THE iDOLM@STER: Cinderella Girls: Nagatomi Hasumi wears this with a jacket in one of her cards.
• Yuugi Hoshiguma from Touhou wears a shirt that strongly resembles one, which makes sense as it would be easy to do exercises in that.
• Toukidenshou Angel Eyes: One of the fighters, Chibiko, wears a blue buruma as her default outfit.
• Present in Yandere Simulator. Notably, if Yandere-chan splashes something onto another student, they will wear this outfit for the rest of the day because their uniform is wet. It's also an option for Yandere-chan to wear if she has to burn her uniform to hide evidence of her murdering someone.

Visual Novels

• CLANNAD: Kyou Fujibayashi (pictured above) often wears this during sport with her white thighhigh socks for even greater effect. The female extras in various scenes of the anime also generally wear this style when appropriate, sometimes with jackets.
• Fate/stay night: Illya wears one in her No Fourth Wall appearances in the Tiger Dojo.
• Katawa Shoujo: Emi Ibarazaki practically lives in one.

---