Patchouli thinks every girl should wear one.
The Japanese school swimsuit (also abbreviated to sukumizu, from "school mizugi [swimsuit]") is a staple of anime and manga. Generally speaking, it's a pair of trunks for boys and a one-piece for girls, at least in its most well-known pop culture depiction.note
Because swimming classes are often mandatory in Japanese schools, a standard swimming uniform is required, so the dark blue one-piece is etched into the collective Japanese consciousness. When the term sukumizu comes up among fans of Japanese media, it's most often used to describe the girls' variation of the uniform.
While it is not particularly exposing, it nevertheless manages to serve as fanservice, as well as a prime source of nostalgia and moe appeal. Often, middle and high school swimming classes serve as one of the first times students get to see their cuter classmates in something that shows their growing figures, and this memory, coupled with awkward early puberty hormones, is what makes this swimsuit memorable to people recalling their teenage years.
Most often, the sex appeal of a sukumizu is only applied to female characters, since Most Writers Are Male. It's not unheard of to have the male equivalent play the same role, but it's much more uncommon. In fact, even though the uniform is universally dark blue, it's not uncommon to see color variants for fanservice appeal, especially white versions, for somewhat obvious reasons. If a female character wears a school swimsuit during a Beach Episode rather than wearing a bikini, it is to show that she is more modest (or in some cases, more immature) than the rest of the cast. In Shōjo works, wearing a sukumizu outside of school is a major faux pas, and you can expect to have characters scrambling to get her proper swimwear lest she be seen as uncool.
Like with the School Sport Uniform and Sailor Fuku, the classic look of a sukumizu is a very common fanservice image that persists in Japanese pop culture, but doesn't quite reflect reality. Student complaints have led to the well-known, gender-divided swimming uniforms being replaced with more modest unisex designs, which are more comfortable and easier to wear, as well as accommodating to gender non-conforming students. The new designs are slowly being rolled out
in select schools.
Contrast Barely-There Swimwear. See also Joshikousei and Catholic School Girls Rule.
Important note: If image links are provided, please be discreet, tasteful, and/or discerning!
Examples
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Anime and Manga
- Ringo from Air Gear wears one as part of her "Crescent Mask" disguise. People even call her "School Swimsuit Mask" while she's wearing that disguise, to the point where she slips up and calls herself that.
- The main character of Akane-iro ni Somaru Saka has a big fetish for school swimsuits. At the end of the anime, Minato wears one for him.
- Azumanga Daioh:
- School swimsuits tend to only come up when swimming at school (natch), with mostly bikinis being worn to the beach at Chiyo's summer home and to Okinawa. Osaka and Chiyo wear more modest swimsuits that resemble the school swimsuits, but are clearly differentiated.
- In the manga, Yukari wears a bikini to the school pool while the swimming club is meeting there. She considers that it might be too much for the young boys to handle, but if she wore a school swimsuit, "they might like that better."
Kurosawa: I guess it's a matter of taste...
- Kimura is just plain obsessed with them. In the manga, when Tomo suggests making a girly uniform for their School Festival, he already has a design for it, involving a school swimsuit, a school uniform top, a pair of bunny ears, and pantyhose. Later, he notes in front of his class that a friend of his, who teaches at an all-girl school, told him that the kids there wear their PE outfits in homeroom because they have PE as their first class. "And in summer, they wear their... their swimsuits..." He bursts into tears at the thought.
- Nemu Kurotsuchi gets to wear one in Bleach's Beach Episode. Funnily enough, Tite Kubo drew her wearing one in the art book because he decided it was the most perverted swimsuit an adult could wear.
- In Cardcaptor Sakura, Tomoeda Elementary has uniforms for everything: bathing suits, warm-weather uniform, cold-weather uniform, ski outfit, winter coat, gym clothes...
- Chocotto Sister: There is official artwork of Choco wearing one of these. Even though Chocotto is never shown going to school.
- While she's (sadly) never seen wearing it, Nagisa from CLANNAD says she wouldn't mind wearing one of these if Tomoya wanted.
- The Ashford Academy swimsuit in Code Geass is essentially this, but with the school's emblem over the left hip rather than the white nametag. Although it's got the feel of a competitive swimsuit in the cut of the legs and the crossed straps in the back. It's most commonly seen on Shirley, an honest-to-goodness member of the swimming team, but one episode shows C.C. kicking back into school pool after hours.
- In The Disappearance of Nagato Yuki-chan, Yuki is convinced to buy a swimsuit by being told that otherwise, she will not be able to compete with the other girls' flashier outfits and get Kyon's attention with her school swimsuit.
- Don't Toy with Me, Miss Nagatoro: Nagatoro often has teased Senpai about modeling for him in one of these. She's often seen wearing it due to being a part-time member of the school's swimming club.
- Do You Love Your Mom and Her Two-Hit Multi-Target Attacks?: When Masato and his party are doing the School Event in the game, there's a class that takes place in the school's indoor pool, which means the girls have to wear these. He dreads the moment because he knows Mamako is going to show up too and, sure enough, she appears wearing an old-fashioned school swimsuit.
- In episode 7 of Dream Eater Merry, Yuuji is dismayed that his friend Isana has picked out one of these for otherworldly visitor Merry Nightmare, prompting this immortal line:
Yuuji: Couldn't you have found a swimsuit that shows off Merry's vagina bones a little better?
- Excel from the Excel♡Saga manga once wears a school swimsuit to a beach, and gets a lot of attention. She's long since out of high school, but never bought another swimsuit because she didn't want to waste any money. She also wears one in the anime, specifically for Fanservice purposes. Excel is shown graduating from high school at the start of the first episode. What that means in regards to her age, given the general continuity level of the series, is an exercise best left for the viewer.
- In Fruits Basket, Tohru wears her school swimsuit from middle school to the pool since she can't afford a more flattering one, which prompts her friends to take up a collection to buy her a new swimsuit.
- Full Metal Panic? Fumoffu: When Tessa visits Japan, she gets "convinced" by Kurz that she should wear a School Swimsuit that makes her stand out from Jindai High's one. Then Kaname makes a mention that her swimsuit is something that "maniacs would find attractive." And by "convinced" we mean Kurz staged a full debriefing as if it were a military operation, complete with surveillance photos of high school girls at the pool, a 3D model of a girl in said suit, and all sorts of data flashing across the screen. And Tessa watched it in surprise as almost the entire male crew listened and nodded in solemn agreement.
- In Gakuen Babysitters, Inomata initally goes to the beach in her middle school swimsuit. Usaida jokes around by asking whether or not she has a fetish, and the female teachers insist that they go and get her something cuter. She switches to a normal swimsuit afterward.
- Everytime there's a swimsuit episode in Galaxy Angel, Mint is wearing a school swimsuit.
- The episode of Gate Keepers where the invaders try to use Shun to seduce the girls. They are all wearing bikinis but they end up wearing school swimsuits by the episode's end.
- Girls und Panzer:
- During the first OVA, in which the cast goes to the beach, Mako mentions that she has a school swimsuit, and initially thinks that's good enough, but soon gets caught up in the other girls' shopping for swimsuits.
- In Motto Love Love Sakusen Desu, Sodoko and the rest of the disciplinary committee wear them, and she, being a stickler for the rules, insists that the other students should wear theirs as well. She, however, is horrified to discover that her swimsuit has her nickname on it instead of her last name.
- H₂O: Footprints in the Sand has a male example. Don't ask.◊
- Nagi (plus a younger Maria on a flashback) from Hayate the Combat Butler wears this on the manga, the first anime AND the OVA before the second anime. And the circumstances are different on each case. In the OVA's case, it made her the only one fulfilling the narrator's promise of "Prepare to die of moe"!
- In Heaven's Lost Property, the main character's class has a School Swimsuit-Meido cafe. And it works.
- In High School Girls, Ayano wears a traditional School Swimsuit on a date... even though the actual school swimsuits are a more modern design.
- In Hitohira, the first page of Chapter 13: A Crucial Experience has Mugi in a school swimsuit for no reason related to the plot. She's holding a kickboard and blushing as she kneels alongside the starting blocks.
- Ikki Tousen: In a beach episode, Chouhi Ekitoku, for some unknown reason wears the swimsuit of her school.
- For some reason, all the female pilots in Infinite Stratos have this as part of their uniforms. During the Beach Episode, Laura's superior informs her that a school-issue swimsuit is absolutely insufficient for attracting the attention of her "bride", and recommends an extremely skimpy one instead.
- The twelfth episode of the anime Is This A Zombie? shows Yuu wearing the older skirted version on the group's outing to an indoor pool. She still has to wear some of her armor, though.
- In Kaiju Girls, Gomora's body suit is classic school swimsuit.
- Keijo!!!!!!!!'s whole series has this. It's a battle Shōnen where girls try to push eachother into a pool using only their boobs and butts while standing on an unstable floating platform.
- Love After World Domination: In the Beach Episode, Beast Princess is shown wearing a school swimsuit. Funnily enough, she's embarrassed about it despite covering her more than her usual Stripperific outfit.
- Konata from Lucky Star wears her school swimsuit on a beach, because of "people with special interests". Kagami is astonished that Konata can still fit into a swimsuit from the sixth grade! (And then she bursts Konata's fanservice bubble by pointing out that "special interests" people probably don't come to the beach.)
- In the 6th episode of Magikano, a ghost is placated when each girl's bikini is replaced with a sukumizu.
- The My Hero Academia anime features them in a Beach Episode, but the Fanservice aspect is largely a Subversion—upon learning that the girls got permission to use the school pool for sunbathing, Mineta and Kaminari arrange a "training session" at the same time and are annoyed that they're wearing school bathing suits (the modern version that resemble wetsuits) instead of the tiny bikinis they had been imagining.
- Negima! Magister Negi Magi:
- Some of the girls wear these. Understandable, given that they're in school and all. But some of the girls will wear them outside of school, while others wear something flashier (and often skimpier).
- The most hilarious use of this was during the Mahora Festival Tournament Arc where Eva found herself in a bet with Al where she will be forced to enter her next match wearing a school swimsuit together with a whole bunch of other classic fanservice accessories if Setsuna loses the match. Even resident pervert Chamo was impressed at Al's knowledge of turn-ons.
- In an early episode of Neon Genesis Evangelion, Shinji is explaining to his friends that he is fascinated with Rei, while they're ogling the girls in their swimsuits. Shinji doesn't mean that he's fascinated with her sexually, but his friends certainly interpret it that way — asking exactly which part of her body he's so enamoured with.
- In Nurse Hitomi's Monster Infirmary, the female students and Hitomi wear them during swimming lesson season. The cover of Volume 6 shows Hitomi and Tobita wearing them, Hitomi with her Labcoat of Science and Medicine over it.
- Omamori Himari: When Shizuku attacks Yuuto and Himari when they're at the beach, she shows up wearing one of these.
- Paradise Residence chapter 8 by Kosuke Fujishima shows the girls in school swimsuits and some in spats as they clean up a dirty pool that was hit by a typhoon.
- Plus-Sized Elf: In chapter 7 all the girls go to a pool wearing competition swimsuits in another of their attempts to lose weight.
- In Pokémon the Series: Sun & Moon, Lana is shown to wear a school swimsuit under her everyday clothes. As she's a fisherman's daughter who spends a lot of time in the sea, as well as the resident water-type Pokémon specialist, this makes sense.
- Some Pool Scenes in Ranma ½ have the Fūrinkan girls wearing school swimsuits... including Female!Ranma, who have little choice since s/he the cannot stay male in the cold water of the pool, and thus has to don a girl swimsuit. The various Beach Episodes have more diverse suits.
- RIN-NE: The series takes place in high school, so when swimming season comes along there are some chapters that center around the school's swimming pool. Since these chapters tend to focus more on Sakura's experiences with the local ghosts, it's inevitable that it's the female classmates and the female teachers that spend most of the time in the swimsuits, with some changing room scenes thrown in for good measure. Seeing as it's Rumiko Takahashi of Magic Skirt fame, however, even the Fanservice shots are quite tastefully done.
- Saki: Yuuki and Saki wear these in the second ending and on the mandatory Beach Episode (Though Saki's might be just a similar-looking one-piece). They also happen to be the only flat-chested girls in the Five Girl Band. There's also official art of the entire Five Girl Band wearing a school swimsuit.
- School Mermaid: The titular mermaids wear them for some odd reason. Though most importantly is the letter on their chests The name of the boy you want to fall in love is corresponded by said letter. And is the mermaid you need to catch and eat for the spell to be completed. If you fail to do so before sunrise, your clothes disintegrate and form into a swimsuit as part of the transformation into a mermaid.
- Natsumi from Sgt. Frog is seen in her school swimsuit in an early episode. Her swimsuit even gets incorporated into her "Powered 723" battle-suit, much to her chagrin.
- In Harem Anime SHUFFLE!, during the Beach Episode Nerine's father decides to invoke this trope, making his daughter dress up in a School Swimsuit to play to the fetish. Instead, everyone present finds the moment awkward before they just move on.
- In Squid Girl, Ika Musume has a white swimsuit that she wears as underclothes. Her 1/6 Pure Neemo Character doll from A-ZONE comes with the swimsuit as an alternate outfit.
- In Strawberry Marshmallow, when the girls go to the beach, Miu eventually notices that Chika and Matsuri are wearing their swimsuits from school, but nothing comes of it... for them, anyway.
- Strike Witches: Yoshika, Mio and Shizuka wear this under their uniforms (well, the shirts...), probably since they come from Japan... uh, Fuso.
- Super Robot Wars: Original Generation: The Inspectors has ending scene resemble Beach Episode with each girl wearing bikinis, with exception of Latooni Subota who wear a school swimsuit.
- In the Extra Edition of Sword Art Online, the girls take Suguha to their school's pool to teach her how to swim. She's embarrassed when she finds out they all brought cute swimsuits while she brought her school one.
- In Toradora!, Taiga, Minori, and Ami go shopping for one, which sets off Taiga's A-Cup Angst. Subverted later by Ami, who wears a bikini for her pool race with Taiga, claiming her school swimsuit hadn't dried.
- In the Valkyria Chronicles anime, the Beach OVA has Isara wearing a school swimsuit, probably because Aisha doesn't appear and Isara is the youngest and cutest girl (and flat). In a series that happens in Europe, in a pseudo-World War II. Let's not think too hard about it.
- Wandering Son has a chapter, and and episode in the anime adaptation, where the characters were in swimsuits. One of the characters wore one of her two-piece swimsuits instead of the school one, like all the other girls.
- Kotori Mizuki and her female classmates in Yu-Gi-Oh! ZEXAL, being 7th graders, wear the a competition version with covered cleavage (example with Kotori◊). Like their standard uniform, it is pink and white. Not known if the upper classes have green and blue versions due to the same reason. However, because of ZEXAL being set 20 Minutes in the Future, this example might fall victim of a minor case of Future Society, Present Values due to the aforementioned redesign.
Fan Works
- There are numerous examples of the girls of Gensokyo shown wearing such swimsuits. The most common targets are Nitori and Youmu.
- Of special note is the artist/musician WINN, who has a whole series of fanart and fanvids featuring the Girls wearing school swimsuits.
- Winn is almost certainly the best example of this trope (at least as far as Touhou + school swimsuits goes), considering that he even manages to work in action scenes and the occasional positive moment. That is... not exactly easy when your main character is dressed for fetish appeal. See for yourself.
Literature
- The Worst Witch: In The Worst Witch All At Sea, the girls take a seaside holiday with the school. They are horrified to be issued with striped old timey bathing suits, which resemble their school uniform, complete with school badges.
Live-Action TV
- Glee has a synchronized swimming team, which allows the scenes with Coach Roz Washington as well as Fanservice. The usual uniform is red◊, while the suits worn in "We Found Love"◊ are of the "skirt" variety. One episode of The Glee Project also featured the red suits.
- In The Goldbergs, the girls in Adam Goldberg's gym class are not at all happy with having to wear the school-regulation swimming cozzie. By the end of the episode, they are allowed to wear T-shirts over them.
Toys
- Frame Arms Girls Hresvelgr is modeled to be wearing a school swimsuit.
- Kotobukiya's Cu-poche miniature poseable action doll lineup has a optional body that is molded wearing one of these.
- A-ZONE's Picco Neemo 1/12 dolls have both blue and white school swimsuits available.
Video Games
- Arcana Heart: Kira Daidouji wears one all the time. Her entrance starts with her wearing a Modesty Towel that she dramatically flings away at the same time that she puts on her swimsuit.
- The Dead or Alive Xtreme subseries have school swimsuits in navy blue, navy blue with name tag, and white. The main series occasionally features them as well, going all the way back to the PlayStation port of the original game.
- One of the randomly selected pictures shown upon clearing a stage in Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice depicts a number of the female class types wearing these, which is fitting, considering the game's school setting.
- EXA_PICO has a fair amount of artwork of the Reyvateils wearing school swimsuits.
- In Fate/Grand Order, Helena Blavatsky in her summer variation wears the swimsuit in her base level. Averted in her later ascensions.
- In Granblue Fantasy, Lyria wears one whenever she wants to go swimming in the summer events of the game.
- Guardian Tales has two summer units — Little Android AA72 and Lifeguard Yuze — wear school swimsuits, the former wearing the classic one due to her having a child-like form and the latter wearing the "competition swimsuit" variant due to her being a young adult.
- Gurumin: A Monstrous Adventure: The protagonist, Parin, has one of these as her swimsuit of choice. It's also a bonus costume.
- Every submarine except U-511 in KanColle wears one, and even she changes into one when you modernize her into RO-500.
- Kana wears one in Karin's Skin Diving Diary! Karin herself can get her own from helping Kana out. This doubles as a Leotard of Power as wearing it during a dive makes used materials last longer and makes it easier to discover certain points of interest, such as underwater caves and sunken ships.
- In Lightning Legend: Daigo no Daibouken, the dark-blue older version of it is Yuki Shirogane's unlockable alternate outfit.
- In Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A's Portable: The Gears of Destiny, this is one of Reinforce Eins' unlockable alternate outfits, complete with a swimming tube. Yes, Reinforce Eins. The tragic, mother-like, Really 700 Years Old personification of a Weapon of Mass Destruction. Rule of Funny.
- Roll wears one as an alternate playable variant in Mega Man X DiVE. To go with it, her attacks also do water elemental damage.
- Mimmy from No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle wears a white version of this swimsuit. Justified, since she's essentially a personification of all of Travis Touchdown's anime-related fetishes.
- Pangya has one of these swimsuits available for Kooh to wear.
- Pokémon:
- The young female Tuber trainers in Pokémon Diamond and Pearl and Platinum wear these.
- Trial Captain Lana in Pokémon Sun and Moon wears one under her everyday clothes, just like she does in the anime adaptation.
- Makoto Aihara from Rumble Roses wears one for her alternate swimwear attire. Her Heel persona comes with a much skimpier version. There is also a version more revealing than Makoto's but less than her Heel persona not assigned to any specific character but can be purchased in the in game shop.
- Street Fighter has Ibuki, the girly ninja who wears the skirted variant. Although with hers she wears several ninja accessories in the otherwise exposed areas such as her legs and arms.
- Triggerheart Exelica: Exelica's bodysuit is a white school swimsuit.
Western Animation
- In The Amazing World of Gumball episode, "The Roots", Anais is probably a rare Western variant of this trope, as she wears a Dark Blue Swimsuit uniform.
Real Life
- Japan-based swimsuit maker, Footmark, is regularly coming up with new designs for school swimsuits to make them more conservative and appealing. Aside from the gender-neutral designs mentioned above, another such design meant for girls is the "Double Flare Skirt One-Piece".
Officially named the "Double Flare Skirt One-Piece", this newly released swimsuit allows young girls to cover up during swimming lessons at school. The skirt portion of the swimsuit features a double flare design and ruffled sleeves. It also has a raised, boat neck-style neckline, reducing the amount of exposed skin.
- To anyone looking for their own: they are avalable on J-Box.
