the use of corsets. Japan Utako Shimoda (1854-1936), a women's activist, educator and dress reformer, found traditional kimono to be too restrictive, preventing women and girls from moving and taking part in physical activities, harming their health. While Western dress was being adopted at the time, she also believed corsets to be restrictive and harmful to women's health. Utako Shimoda had worked as lady-in-waiting to Empress Shōken from 1871 to 1879. She adapted the clothing worn by ladies-in-waiting at the Japanese imperial court to make a uniform for her Jissen Women's School. During the Meiji period (1868–-1912) and Taishō period (1912–-1926), other women's schools also adopted the . It became standard wear for high schools in Japan, though it was later mostly replaced with Western sailor-style uniforms. Inokuchi Akuri also designed sports clothes for children. At the imperial court, simplified replaced more cumbersome garments. The Netherlands In the Netherlands, interest for the issue was aroused after the foundation of a dress reform society in neighboring Germany, and in 1899 the Dutch dress reform society Veereeniging voor Verbetering van Vrouwenkleeding (V.v.V.v.V.). The dress reform society held lectures, participated in exhibitions and worked with designed to produce a new fashion for women which could be not only attractive but also comfortable and healthy at the same time. Norway While there were no separate dress reform societies founded in Norway, the women's rights society Norsk Kvinnesaksforening actively addressed the issue under the influence of the Swedish Dress Reform Society from the 1880s; they collaborated with Stockholm and Copenhagen with the design of reform costumes and the exposition of them, notably during the Nordic Exhibition of 1888. Norway is in fact described as one of the countries were the interest and success for the issue was greatest. The physician Lorentz Dietrichson, a prominent participant for the abolition of the corset in the corset controversy in both Sweden and Norway, held a lecture in Norway in favor of dress reform already in 1886, as a commentary of the Swedish dress reform movement in which he himself also participated; the Swedish dress reform society successfully exhibited their reform dress in Oslo, the Norsk Kvinnesaksforening became interested, and the movement thereby started in Norway the same year as in Sweden. Johanne Biörn held lectures in the Oslo schools, and the Norwegian designer Kristine Dahl experienced success not only in her home country of Norway but also in