A very special Maid Monday, the sub-series where I post and rate maid designs.
Today's maids, Service units SU-01, SU-02, SU-03, and SU-04. And the Solitude in Service series by Koyorin. (Posted with permission, check them out at Koyorin.com)
I adore these designs. I think Koyorin's art style is really striking, and it lends itself really well to a good maid design.
To address the elephant in the room, yes these designs are very fan servicey (I've said before it's not a bad thing, just not something I prefer on a maid). But it works really well on these designs, and it comes down to one main reason.
Othering.
I think something that attracts a lot of people to the concept of a maid, myself included, is that maids are servants. In a romanticized view they live to serve their master or mistress first and before themselves. To some this is appealing from a sub/dom relationship, for others it harks back to a knight in shining armor like vision of always being there in times of need. But I think beyond the romantic there's also an underlying dystopian note to them. Someone who's had their humanity stripped of them to become an object of servitude. It's one of the reasons I'm so critical of fan servicey designs because I feel like it leans into the whole object to be used side of a maid.
But, when done right, that side can be really powerful. And it's why I love these designs so much.
For the Service units, their overtly feminine aspects combined with the uncanny mechanical bits like the exposed spine and hips, the clear skin, and unnatural skin colors (which also call back to a black maid dress), contrasted to the very human faces is really uncanny and borders on body horror, something I'm a huge fan of.
As for Solitude in Service, it's a bit more subtle in an unsubtle way. Compared to the service units she had an admittedly generic maid uniform, but that just makes the tattoos stand out even more. I really recommend taking the time to zoom in and appreciate the details, I imagine it must have taken forever to draw. It speaks of being pushed aside and othered. Of feeling like you can't be you.
Maids today are very much a fetish icon. I don't think that's bad or good, it just is. Part of this series has been, for me anyways, reclaiming the idea of a maid into that traditional, romanticized servant. However I think both ignore the true reality that both could be really oppressive.
If you've ever worked in customer service of any kind, you'll know you can't have personal feelings. No matter what the customer does, you have to suck it up, smile and nod. Be respectful or you might be out of the job.
Same applies to a maid. Even if a maid loves their job, role, or master, part of being the perfect maid means being unable to be yourself. Having to suck it up, smile, nod, and be respectful. Else you loose your job. To some this can be a big draw, like how a nun or priest give up everything out of their love to serving their lord. However it can also equally lean into becoming traumatizing with how it others you.
I don't know if these themes were intentional or if I'm just looking too far into it. But either way these deserve to be at the highest rating of Uniform Tier.
Again, thank you to Koyorin for letting me do a Maid Monday on their art. If you want to support Koyorin you can actually get all of these designs as prints on Inprint, so go give them some support.
