A breast that has nursed, a breast whose support tissue has loosened with age, a huge breast (bakunyu) too heavy to resist gravity from the start. The form flows downward and the nipple points below the horizontal. Tarechi-chichi appears to sit at the opposite pole from youth and firmness, yet in another context it constitutes an independent axis of preference as a sign of maturity and motherhood. The very imprint of age becomes sexual value: a bodily figure symbolising the doubleness of contemporary adult culture.

Tarechi-chichi is the colloquial term for breasts that have descended for some reason. Anatomically it is called breast ptosis, arising from the balance between reduced support from skin, Cooper’s ligaments, and fat tissue, and the weight of the mammary tissue. Aging, childbirth, nursing, weight fluctuation, large size, and genetics all play a part.

Anatomy and physiology

The main structures supporting breast form are the tension of the skin, Cooper’s ligaments (the connective tissue linking the mammary gland to the skin), and the elasticity of the mammary tissue itself. With age, collagen and elastin decline, and repeated stretching and contraction through pregnancy and nursing reduce the force holding the breast upward. The mammary tissue then flows downward, the whole breast descends, and the nipple moves below the horizontal.

The degree of ptosis is classified in plastic surgery into four grades (mild, moderate, severe, and pseudoptosis). In mild ptosis the nipple sits at roughly the level of the inframammary fold; in moderate, a few centimetres below; in severe, lower still; pseudoptosis describes a high nipple but a mammary body that has descended.

Position as a preference

In mainstream adult, gravure, and fashion markets, young firm upward-facing breasts are presented as the standard ideal. Lingerie makers, cosmetic surgery, and supplement advertising treat breast ptosis as an “unwanted sign of aging”, an object of correction and prevention. Socially it is positioned as a negative bodily sign as standard.

Yet in a certain area of the adult market, sagging breasts form an independent genre as an active object of preference. In married-woman (hitozuma), mature-woman, and mother-themed works, sagging huge and large breasts (kyonyuu) are emphasised as signs of maturity and motherhood. A breast that has nursed, softened with age, and sways under its own weight presents a physical and psychological texture distinct from a young firm breast.

The difference is encoded concretely. First, the size and slowness of the sway: a descended breast sways with larger amplitude and slower period, conveying weight visually. Second, the softness of touch: the changed ratio of fat to mammary tissue makes it more pliant than a young breast. Third, changes in the areola (nyuurin) and nipple: pigmentation deepens and the areola enlarges with nursing, combining with sag to form signs of maturity.

Reception psychology

Several layers explain why sagging breasts function as an independent preference.

First, projection onto motherhood. The descended breast is a bodily sign of nursing, and reading it as the core of mature femininity is the heart of the mature-woman genre. The aspect at work is consumption of the sign of motherhood itself, biologically independent of any proxy for feeling toward one’s own mother.

Second, a preference for age. Affection for the female body from the late thirties through the fifties takes a position as explicit resistance and differentiation against a mainstream market that places youth at the centre of beauty. Modest in market size, it has held steady demand over the long term.

Third, a preference for the natural. Against breasts shaped by cosmetic surgery, lifted by padding, or “performing” youth, the sagging breast is read as a sign of the unmodified body, connecting to keywords of “real”, “natural”, and “bare” in amateur and married-woman works.

Derived forms

• Gravity breasts: a colloquialism emphasising physically downward-flowing breasts.
• Breast-milk breasts: engorged sagging breasts in the nursing period, accompanied by milk.
• Sagging huge breasts: a state combining size and descent.
• Heavy breasts: breasts slow to move under their weight.

Cultural history

The lineage treating sagging breasts as a sexual preference parallels the Western BBW (big beautiful women) culture and the Japanese mature-woman boom. In Japan, mature-woman AV established itself as an independent genre from the late 1990s, forming a market from the 2000s in combination with keywords such as “married woman”, “mature woman”, “mother”, and “boin”. Specialist makers and labels were founded in numbers, and the market grew steadily.

In the history of nude art, female-body representations that do not fixate on youth exist East and West, from the female figures of Rubens and Rembrandt to nude depictions in modern Japanese painting. The mature-woman genre of the adult market can be read as positioned along the extension of these classical body representations.

Related Terms

• Breasts (oppai)
• Large breasts (kyonyuu)
• Huge breasts (bakunyu)
• Boin (busty)
• Areola (nyuurin)