Japan In the Fashion World, and Tokyo As a Fashion Center

Japan’s history with Western clothing started after it came out of isolation, and opened its doors during the Meiji Era. During this era there were many economic, social, and cultural reforms, and the emperor himself favored and encouraged modernization. Clothing was one way that this was most noticeable. Clothing began to shift away from the traditional kimono to Western styles of dress, as first seen in the uniforms of the military, and then in the uniforms of government workers after 1870. By end of the century by the imperial court began wearing formal kimonos only at traditional events, almost always dressed in Western clothing otherwise.

Western dress during the Meiji period. Photo from castinet.castilleja.org

Western clothing was seen as a sign of sophistication and modernity into the Taisho era (1912-1926), when working women began to also wear Western clothing as their uniforms. Information about fashion began to spread from Europe and the United States following the end of World War II, and Western goods began to be consumed at a more rapid pace in Japanese cities during the 50’s and 60’s. In the 1980’s Japan’s economy boomed, and Western companies were entering the country in order to sell their goods to progressively more fashion savvy consumers. Because of the good economy more and more tourists from Japan began traveling to Paris and buying designer goods.

Japan became steadily more and more fashionable, but no matter how fashionable the country became Tokyo was unable to become a major fashion center. It was unable to receive the same level of recognition as Paris, New York, London, and Milan did in the world of fashion.  This changed, however, in the 1970’s. After decades of considering fashion to be a Western idea, and being a country where fashion was consumed, not produced, Japan found more exposure in the world of fashion through the work of Japanese designers that were working in Paris.

Kenzo in the 1970's. Photo from: www.crochetconcupiscence.com 

The first Japanese designer to attract attention was Kenzo Takada, who in the fashion world is usually known simply as Kenzo. Kenzo was the first Japanese designer to create biannual ready-to-wear collections while in Paris.  Kenzo gained a lot of recognition for doing something no European or United States designer had ever done before – mixing patterns. His clothing was colorful and exciting, with new silhouettes.

Following Kenzo, in the 1970’s, designers Issey Miyake, Yohji Yamamoto, and Rei Kawakubo of Comme des Garcons, began working in Paris. The clothing that these three designers created were avant-garde, and like nothing anyone had seen before. And, at times, the clothes were considered controversial. Their designs deconstructed the norms of the Western world. Clothing in the West had been designed to be fitted garments, but clothing made by Japanese designers was made with a looser fit, or challenged the traditional idea of beauty in Western fashion. In the article “Gang of Four”, by Cathy Horyn (New York Times, 2008), Horyn describes the reactions of Western critics when Rei Kawakubo released what has come to be called her "Lumps and Bumps" collection, a series of garments with huge lumps swollen from them. Many considered it "disfiguring"  to the woman's body, and as is written in the article, one photographer described the hunchbacked looks as being "Quasimodo" like. The clothing made by designers from Japan was not always considered beautiful, which went against the Western idea that fashion was synonymous with beauty. Another Japanese designer in Paris during this time was Hanae Mori, who became the first Japanese couturier in Paris in 1977. She differed from other Japanese designers by designing clothing that was more in line with the fitted, traditional idea of fashion in the west. Kenzo, Issey Miayke, Yohji Yamamoto, and Rei Kawakubo, Jennifer Craik (1994: 41) points out, challenged the Western ideals of the body, body space relations, and conventions of clothing, causing fashion to have increasingly more non-European influences incorporated into it.

Upper left: an outfit from Yohji Yamamoto's Spring/summer 1983 collection
Upper right: A dress designed by Issey Miyake
Bottom: One of the outfits in Rei Kawakubo of Comme des Garcons' "Lumps and Bumps" collection in 1996
Upper left and bottom pictures from: http://www.kci.or.jp

Part of what made Japanese designers unique was their status as non-western fashion designers. Through the fame of these designers Tokyo became known as a city that was “exotic”, and had “different”, but innovative and artistic designers.

Despite the fame of these Japanese designers, Tokyo was still unable to become a major fashion center. The city wasn’t strong enough to encourage journalists from the West to cover collections there. At the same time designers hailing from Japan were going to Paris, because of the status Paris offers designers working there, something Tokyo was unable to give them. Designers in Japan were more interested in Paris than in Tokyo, and until the 1990’s there was a lack of a fashion system that was established and centralized Japan. Tokyo did not have the structural strength to make them a fashion capital. The city found a place in the fashion world through the Japanese designers in Paris, but many members of the Western fashion world who went to Japan saw the Japanese were more interested in Western goods, and were left with disappointment. Throughout the years consumers in Japan have favored Western brands over Japanese brands. This, however, is not necessarily a bad thing, as it signifies that Japan has become modernized and interested in international consumption, and that Tokyo has become a major metropolitan city. But it makes it difficult for Tokyo to secure more of a place in world of fashion.

Ginza, a district in Tokyo that has been famous for being an upscale fashion center
Photo from: www.3wavesjapan.com 

Paris has carried a lot of weight in the minds of the Japanese. Parisian brands are extremely popular there, and despite the problems seen recently in the economy of Japan consumers are still willing to purchase luxury goods from Europe. According to Kawamura’s research (2012:31) 94 percent of women living in Tokyo in their twenties own something made by Louis Vuitton. 92 own something by Gucci. Almost 58 own something by Prada, and almost 52 own something by Chanel. When I first read this I felt incredibly shocked. 94 percent of all women living in their twenties in a city that is home to some 13.23 million people, as of April 1, 2013, is an extremely high number! Before reading Kawamura’s book I was also unaware that the world’s largest Louis Vuitton store is located in Japan. Located in the Omotesando district, the store opened in 2003, with more than a thousand people waiting in line for its grand opening. The store set single-day sales records for the company: 125 million yen (about the equivalent of $1.05 million US dollars). Japan’s consumers have continued to buy imported luxury goods – particularly those from France- with gusto, despite how the Japanese economy has suffered in the past few years.

Louis Vuitton in Tokyo, photo from wikipedia

This doesn’t mean Japan isn’t a fashionable city. That isn’t true at all. It just struggles to have the same strength in the fashion world as Milan, Paris, London and New York. Amongst Asian countries Japan has a strong fashion identity. Many other Asian countries have been unable to establish themselves as fashion centers because of their reputations with the manufacturing of clothing, and being known for cheap labor. As Kawamura states in her book, Tokyo is considered the “fashion capital” of Asia. To establish themselves as a fashion center further, the Council of Fashion Designers (CFD) has been trying in the past (albeit without much success) to organize regular fashion shows, and lately they have been attempting to work with the government, and change much of their structure.

While the obsession with imported goods has caused issues with establishing Japan as a fashion center, one area where Japan continues to receive a lot of attention is its street fashion scene.

Harajuku, photo source unknown

The street fashion scene in Japan – Tokyo in particular – is unlike any other in the world. Harajuku is especially famous in the Japanese street fashion world. It wasn’t until the mid-1990’s, when people began realizing the profit and market potential of fashion subcultures, that the current street fashion subcultures that are more widely known today began occurring. The trends of these youth groups were completely different than those in the West or in mainstream Japanese fashion. One reason, and likely the most prominent, that Harajuku became a center of youth culture was the Hokosha-Tengoku, or Hokoten, in English known as the “pedestrian paradise”, when a part of the main road in Harajuku would be closed to traffic on Sundays, beginning in 1977. This provided a place where people could congregate. Steadily over time it became a place where more and more young people gathered dressed in creative, eclectic outfits. Although the “pedestrian paradise” was brought to an end in 1998, Harajuku has continued to be a place of wild creativity and personal style amongst teenagers.

Participants in one of the Harajuku Fashion Walks, photo from tokyofashion.com

Although it tends to receive most of the attention in the Japanese street fashion scene, Harajuku is not the only place in Tokyo that is home to subculture groups. Other districts, such as Shibuya, Daikanyama, Ikebukuro, and Jiyugaoka, also have their own subcultures.

High school girls have been a key element to any trend within these subcultures. Girls dominate the Japanese subculture scene, so they play a huge role in determining the success of a trend or new subculture. Subcultures are directly related to society’s situations. Kawamura states that the street culture scene in Japan may be lasting longer due to the problems in the economy. As she states in Fashioning Japanese Subcultures, “There is a widespread feeling of disillusionment, alienation, uncertainty, and anger, which has spread throughout Japanese society. This has lead to the breakdown of traditional Japanese values, such as perseverance, discipline, and belief in education – especially among children.”(2012:27) Japanese teenagers have been creating and leading trends in Japan for years, and subcultures have begun pulling the fashion world’s attention away from the runway and onto the streets.

Upper left: a Decora girl, photo from tokyofashion.com

Upper right: a Gyaru, photo from tokyofashion.com

Lower left: a Lolita, photo from Japanese Streets

Lower right: a boy in Dolly Kei style, photo source unknown

Media has been hugely responsible for exposing Japanese street fashion to the globe. Magazines are crucial to any fashion movement, and magazines such as FRUiTS, which has published monthly since 1997, showcasing photographs of cutting edge Harajuku fashion.  Other popular magazines are Kera, Tune, and the The Gothic and Lolita Bible, which caters primarily to the Lolita subculture. While typically these publications are only sold domestically, things like the internet have made it possible for these subcultures to reach a global audience. Some Japanese magazines have begun selling in foreign bookstores, some in other languages, and some online blogs, such as tokyofashion.com have gained large followings frequently posting current photographs of different street styles in Japan.

A copy of FRUiTS. Photo source unknown

 

The creativity of these youth subcultures, and the exposure gained through media, is helping to put Japan more on the fashion map. Some street wear designers from Japan are now taking inspiration from young people, like the ones in Harajuku, and showing their work in Paris and New York. But in order to more firmly secure an identity as a fashion center, Japan needs to be able to promote fashion to a worldwide audience more than they have in the past, and have more noticeable fashion related events taking place there.

Two teens in Harajuku, photo from tokyofashion.com

After reading about Tokyo as a fashion center, my professor and I talked about what we thought on the subject. When talking about Tokyo’s attempts to better establish itself as a center for fashion there is usually a tendency to compare it to Paris. This isn’t really fair, because Tokyo will never be Paris. This has nothing to do with Tokyo being a non-Western nation, but there are no cities that will ever be Paris. Fashion has been a huge part of French culture for hundreds of years. No other country has had the same level of dependence on fashion as France has had. Other fashion centers don’t economically rely as much on fashion as France, where fashion is a huge part of the economy. So to compare Tokyo to a fashion Mecca like Paris is completely unfair.

http://cdn.japandailypress.com

My professor also pointed out that, even though critics thought of Rei Kawakubo’s “Lumps and Bumps” collection as distorting the female body, it was not really a new concept in the world of fashion. Throughout history fashion has never been about the natural shape of the body, but has added extensions to it. Rei Kawakubo’s designs may have been seen as odd for their time, but when you look at other fashion trends that have occurred in history it’s nothing new.

Another dress from the "Lumps and Bumps" collection of Comme des Garcons
from http://makingtheunfinished.files.wordpress.com

One of the things I began to think is that, while Paris and Milan tend to be the more popular of the European fashion centers to buy goods from in mainstream Japanese fashion it appears that, in my opinion, Japanese street style has more of a connection to fashion from London. Of all the established fashion centers London is most known for its street fashion. Brands such as Vivienne Westwood and Boy London have seen popularity on the streets of Harajuku, and a street fashion trend that was popular a few years ago (but no longer a prominent trend) was elements on England in clothing, such as Union Jack shirts and bags. Seeing that, as I said, London is known for its street fashion, it only makes sense to me that there would be a connection.

My final thought was that I believe people are expecting too much from Japan in too short a period of time. Japan opened its doors to the West less than 200 years ago, which may seem like a long period of time, when it’s really not. Our society is becoming one that focuses too much on instantaneous success, and I think people who look at Japan in relation to being a fashion center become impatient. It takes a long time, and the right circumstances, for a city to achieve success as a fashion center. I’m an American, so I can’t really speak for how people in places like Italy, England, or France view their home fashion centers, but as for the United States I think that people often forget that the only reason New York was able to establish itself as a fashion center in the 1940’s was because the Nazi occupation in Paris made it impossible to produce fashion there. Before that New York was in a state similar to Tokyo. So I think that Tokyo’s day is coming, but it will just take a little while.

Shibuya Crossing, photo from http://travelingcanucks.com

One more thing! I had a lot of these photos saved on my computer for a presentation I did on Harajuku fashion, and so aside from the ones from tokyofashion.com and japanesestreets.com I’m not really sure where the others came from, and was having trouble finding some. So, simply put, none of these photos are mine. I own nothing. You probably figured that, but I’m just reiterating it.