Koolture Magazine

SGD$8.00

WHERE CULTURE INSPIRES FASHION

MAR 2013

www.nicopanda.co.jp

LAFORET HARAJUKU

1-11-6 JINGUMAE, SHIBUYA-KU, TOKYO 150-0001

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contributors CEO/BUREAU CHIEF Frank Cintamani MANAGING DIRECTOR Derek Ho

SINGAPORE EDITORIAL EDITOR Jeremy Gopalan WRITERS Dom Yeo Adibah Isa

CREATIVE

JAPAN

ASSISTANT ART DIRECTOR Paulyn Ng

BUREAU CHIEF Sharon Cintamani

SENIOR DESIGNERS Cindy Chan Jeremy Ding

GROUP EDITORIAL DIRECTOR Hakeda Ayasaki

DESIGNER Chan Sin Yee

GROUP MANAGING EDITOR Matsumi Hinari

SALES

JAPAN BUREAU CHIEF Tsukasa Hiroki

EDITOR-AT-LARGE James Tulley

SALES DIRECTOR Samantha Tng

CONTRIBUTING LIFESTYLE EDITOR Jafri M

SENIOR SALES MANAGER Janet Tay

EDITORIAL INTERN Rhys Yahya

EVENTS, PROMOTION AND CIRCULATION ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF EVENTS Benedict Goh

ON THE COVER: Ikeda Hirari PHOTOGRAPHY: Ricky Lee FASHION STYLIST: Amanda Fey CLOTHES: Nicopanda Japan

FASHION

TENTS

18 RISE OF A FASHION CAPITAL

6 IN THE AVANTGAMI WORLD

FUTURE BEAUTY SHOWCASE IN LONDON

8 2013 TOKYO FASHION WEEK IT’S FASHION WEEK IN JAPAN

TOKYO MAKES ITS MARK IN THE FASHION WORLD CULTURE

20 STEREOTYPING INSANITY!

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JAPANESE YOUTHS TAKE SUBCULTURES TO A NEW LEVEL

10 MOTLEY HAVEN TOKYO FASHION DISTRICTS

12 TOKYO STREET SNAPS GET INSPIRED WITH FASHIONISTAS ON THE STREETS

22 JAPANESE KOOLTURE WHEN CULTURE INSPIRES FASHION P8

EDUCATION

24 TRANSFORMATION RECONSTRUCTION THE SHINGO SATO TECHNIQUE

FEATURE

16 BUNKA FASHION COLLEGE

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TOKYO’S DESIGN POWERHOUSE P22

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SUMMER FASHION SHOWCASE @JCC

NEW IN THE HARAJUKU LANE Nicola Formichetti is one of the most well-known and influential creatives in the fashion world today. His countless projects range from styling global superstars like Lady Gaga to fashion directing Vogue Homme Japan to acting as head creative at Mugler and working with Japanese juggernaut Uniqlo. Formichetti launched his own brand Nicopanda in 2011. Nicopanda’s quirkykawaii designs quickly gained a worldwide following.

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IN THE AVANT-GAMI WORLD The bizarre world of avant-garde Japanese fashion descends on Barbican Art Gallery from tomorrow. Future Beauty showcases 30 years of Japanese clothing design. BY PAUL LEE

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“

Now we have the best yet: a sensational eye and brain-opening view of Japanese fashion that anyone concerned with contemporary visual culture absolutely must see – whether they think they’re interested in fashion or not’. – Mark Hudson

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Exhibitions about fashion tend to divide the public. Those passionately interested in fashion go to them; everybody else doesn’t. There’s a prevailing view that we already hear enough about top models, superstar designers and their attendant dramas through the media, the high street and the imposition of having to go and buy the stuff, without extending the experience into the art gallery. And that’s a crying shame, since London has had a whole wave of superb exhibitions highlighting the aesthetics of fashion – Skin & Bone, Viktor & Rolf, Maison Martin Margiela – that the general public has remained largely unaware of.

Beginning with the wave of great designers who revolutionised Japanese, and global, fashion in the 1980s – Issey Miyake, Yohji Yamamoto and Rei Kawakubo of Comme des Garçons – and moving up to date, Future Beauty takes the twin poles of traditional Japanese aesthetics, ascetic formalism and raunchy phantasmagoria, and pushes them into extreme post-modernity.

From Junya Watanabe’s billowing masses of concertinaed paper to Yamamoto’s gravity-defying, swirling hemlines, the works here (one hesitates to call them simply clothes) push structure to the maximum, with a magisterial disregard for the apparent limitations of materials and the human body. Yet the results never look perverse. That sense of intrinsic aesthetic rightness we think of as peculiarly Japanese is always present.

What is perhaps most surprising is how many of the younger designers, including Tao Kurihara and the Mintdesigns duo, attended London’s Central St Martins School of Art. While that will help bolster the slightlycomplacentbelief that British art education is the best in the world, you can’t help feeling that these young Japanese geniuses have pushed what they’ve learned here into areas no British designer has yet approached.

The outfits on show range from minimalist black-and-white smocks, to intricate origami dresses, and stunning clothes made from bright red, seamless tubing. While some of the creations are totally wearable, others could only be worn by the likes of Lady Gaga. Eating, sitting down or going to the loo in some of the more elaborate clothes would be out of the question.

One outfit had a built-in parasol, one had a face-covering black mask, one featured a huge cushioned bustle, and one consisted of head-to-toe tartan (including a stuffed tartan elephant in place of the sporran).

I’m not sure how much of this will end up on the high street, but the designers’ creativity and skill is impressive and the show is definitely worth a visit. K

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Tokyo Fashion Week, also known as Mercedes-Benz aims to bring Japanese fashion to the world as well as to encourage growth of the Japanese fashion and textiles industry. Koolture has got you covered on what happened in TFW 2013 in Japan. By Derek Stanley

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Stunning crowds of fashion dedicated hype beasts and style junkies with their first ever fashion week presentation, streetwear brand C.E caters to a niche and passionate crew of serious dressers. Curated and represented by the label’s illusive collective, the relaxed, cultural lifestyle each concep-

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tual C.E outfit embodies is unique and expertly refined.

An anonymous voice of the label fills in the gaps and chats i-D through the experience of presenting at TFW and watching Will Bankhead perform the shows bespoke soundtrack live and see clothes in abstract action. K

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TOKYO

PHOTOGRAPHER: KAI

CAN YOU JUST FEEL THE CREATIVE ENERGIES AND THE FASHION EXPRESSIVENESS IN THE YOUTHS TRAIPSING DOWN THE STREETS OF HARAJUKU? WE HAVE CAPTURED THEM ALL FOR YOUR VIEWING KIRA TATSUYA | PLEASURE.

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STREET SNAPS

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PHOTOGRAPHER: KAI KOOLTURE | 15

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7D6N BEAUTILICIOUS TOKYO

FROM SGD$1,898/PAX EARLIEST TRAVEL DATE: 10 JULY 2013

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B ashion

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unka

ollege

Located in Tokyo's urbanized region of Shinjuku, Bunka Fashion College has garnered prestige and respect in the fashion industry and is committed to developing and enhancing an environment for deep learning and training in fashion. In addition, this school publishes Japan's original fashion magazine, "So-en."

By Lou Evans

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Bunka Fashion Collage is located in Shinjuku new urban center.

With a 20-story intelligent building as its center, the campus spreads over a vast site. The locational conditions are ideal for studying fashion, as fashionable towns such as Harajuku, Aoyama and Shibuya are just stone’s throw away.

In addition to studying in the college, firsthand knowledge of worldwide fashion trerend can be grasped in such places, which causes synergistic learning effect. There is a wide variety of jobs in the fashion industry, ranging from well-known jobs such as designer and patternmaker to little-known jobs such as visual merchandiser and CAD operator.

At the same time, the current of times makes some of the names of fashion industry jobs change and invents new jobs as well.The development of the fashion industry knows no stopping, continuously becoming more globalized and speedy to meet customer’s needs for new attractive products and to respond to the rapid change of the production conditions.

To keep advancing together with Japan’s fashion industry, Bunka Fashion College attempts to foster valuable assets and makes a commitment to develop and enhance the educational environment for deep and wide learning.

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We have Bunka Gakuen Costume Museum, which houses more than 20,000 articles, a library which has one of Japan’s greatest collections of fashion-related books, and Fashion Resource Center, which consistently collects, exhibits and stores new materials and documents about textile, video, costume and so on.

With such facilities, we undertake an essential role as a hub not only to collect information from the world but also to transmit information from Japan to the world.

BEHIND HISSTORY

Namiki Dressmaking School, the predecessor of the present Bunka Fashion College, was founded in 1919 as a small dressmaking school for girls. In1923, it became the first authorized vocational college of fashion. It contributed to popularizing western style garments among the Japanese through education and publication of books on dressmaking and fashion. In1936, the school changed its name to Bunka Fashion College and began to publishing So-en, Japan’s first fashion magazine.

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2013 After the Second World War, Bunka promptly developed into an institution that responded to a rapidly changing society. As Japan’s growing ready-towear market and industry evolved into a modern apparel industry, the College shifted its focus from tailoring to commercial-oriented fashion professionals.

The first international student enrolled in 1955, and in 1957, the College became the first Japanese fashion college to open its doors to male students.

Beginning in the 1960s, many Bunka graduates entered the Paris Collections. Among the first to make their mark

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Globalisation has pushed most production overseas so the number of jobs in production industry is limited.

- Dr. Satoshi Onuma, President Bunka Fashion College

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internationally were Kenzo Takada and Yohji Yamamoto, now celebrated worldwide for their ground-breaking designs. They paved the way for such promising new talents as Atsuro Tayama and Keita Maruyama.

In 1973, the College celebrated its 50th anniversary and four years later opened the Costume Museum and the Resource Center. In 1976, Bunka Fashion College was classified as a postsecondarypolytechniccollege,orSenmon-Gakkou,inaccordance with Japan’s new educational law. The College’s new main building opened in1998 and an additional structure was completed in 2003 to coincide with the College’s 80th anniversary. K

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STEREOTYPING INSANITY! GYARU

Found in the heart ofTokyo, youths of these generation are taking subcultures to a whole new, mindblowing level!

By Lance Ryuu

Named for the English word “gal,” gyaru are young girls who dye their hair sickly shades of silver and blonde, get fakey tans and slather the makeup on thicker than Bugs Bunny in drag. They can be found hanging out on street corners in almost every major city, but the movement was born (like almost every freaky Japanese style) in the ultra-hip Harajuku neighborhood of Tokyo.

There are all sorts of subgroups of gyaru, and each successive generation gets weirder than the last.

First came the kogyaru, high school girls who wore sexualized versions of their school uniforms (supershort skirts and incredibly saggy socks) and dyed their hair blond. Once that style peaked, some girls started to go off the rails. Known as ganguro, they slathered dark makeup on their faces, painted their lips white and attached shiny stickers to their faces.

Some of the ganguro, however, weren’t satisfied with looking like panda hookers and went one terrible step further. Calling themselves yamanba, which means“mountain hag”in Japanese, these girls made themselves look as ridiculous as possible, and wore makeup that would make John Wayne Gacy sleep with a nightlight.

DECORA Decora is a Japanese street style popular today. In 1997, the magazine FRUiTS was created to display photographs of Japanese street fashion. Aki Kobayashi, the cover model of the first issue, wrote columns for FRUiTS about her style and how she created her own accessories. Soon, girls began making their own eccentric accessories.

The style became known as Decora, and its followers traded and sold their accessories in Harajuku. Although each Decora outfit is unique, they all have the similarities of being extremely bright, decorative (hence the name), and cute. Decora girls wear an insane amount of plastic accessories and barrettes, neon skirts, colorful socks, and cute character products.

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VISUAL KEI

LOLITA

The result is an unholy hodgepodge of teased hair, industrial drum-fulls of white makeup and more lace than a doily convention. It would be crazy enough if all they did was wear this stuff to concerts and nightclubs, but like the lolita, they aren’t afraid to strut down public streets in clothes that Prince would find undignified.

On the Internet at least, the word “lolita” conjures up images of sweaty middle-aged dudes who hang around schoolyards and get their hard drives confiscated by the FBI. But in Japan, lolita refers to another bizarre subculture. Unlike the gyaru subculture, they are inspired mostly by manga characters and they dress up in clothes so modest, Queen Victoria would tell them to loosen up a little.

Visual kei is mostly inspired by JRock bands where their fashion is dark, theatrical and highly dramatic.

Aspects of visual kei style have even infiltrated regular fashion, as regular young Japanese women wear flouncy scarves in their hair and young men wear ass-hugging jeans. Yes, in about five years, real-life Japan will look exactly like a Final Fantasy

Clad in petticoats, high-collared dresses, bonnets and wielding fluffy parasols, they walk the Bladerunner streets of Tokyo looking like graduates of The Tim Burton School for Girls. There are all kinds of lolita’s, each with their own variation on the theme, but they all share a love of women’s fashions that died out before their grandmothers were born.

cutscene.

And these aren’t just outfits they wear to special clubs or garden parties.

You can see grown women in these full Victorian doll costumes on trains, in book stores and wolfing down cheeseburgers at McDonald’s.

Why, you may ask? It has something to do with the rejection of male-created beauty standards and sexualized dress.

Yes. In Japan, to express their rejection of oppressive cultural stereotypes and proclaim their independence, women dress like creepy school girls. K

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JAPANESE KOOLTURE Fashion has got a taste for the orient and that means rich fabrics and kimono sleeves galore .

Setting its eyes on one of Japan’s icons - Geisha, we see how the Geisha culture has influenced fashion today and on the runway. By Sarah Kim

Even though we were in Milan (at least virtually), Milan took us culturally to the East, and Asian-inspired garment characteristics turned out to be our souvenirs. There is a certain allure with being a Geisha, whose skills include performing various Japanese arts such as classical music, dance and games. After some thought, in a way, aren’t we all modern day Geishas? Our skills include balancing a family, work, strength and femininity, all at the same time, skills which seem impossible to juggle to most. The only difference? Geisha’s had access to the most lavish garments to enhance their beauty, and thanks to Milan, we now do too. Emphasis on the sleeves is a ubiquitous motif found in Milan, probably due to the fact that Kimono’s were a big reference for inspiration, but I like to believe it’s due to the fact that designers in Milan wanted the world to ignite their inner Geisha.

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2013 There was a great emphasis on the sleeves this season throughout Milan, and Gabriele Colangelo didn’t hide under them. Her use of unusual fabrics allowed for a very interesting shape in sleeve, almost like a bubble encapsulating one’s arm, yet that very unusual fabric allowed for a beautiful drape along one’s body, enhancing the feminine nature of the garments.

At Sportax, the mesh gave the garment a, well, predictable “sporty” look, however, the oversized sleeves made it extremely modern and fresh to look at, a sporty, unpredictable geisha if you will.

On a more refined level of a Kimono, Gabriele Colangelo truly referenced the Kimono sleeves in two of her garments. To everyone’s surprise, the look was leaning more towards I-needto-meet-this-woman vibe than it was to a why-is-she-wearinga-Kimono vibe, which made this designer a strong contender for creating the best modern Geisha garment.

FASHION LEADERS Thegeishashavelongbeenknownasfashionleaders.Among the fashion innovations of geisha are the wide band obi, or sash,andthecustomsofwomenwearingeitherhakama(loose trousers or split skirt) and haori (an outer garment) over the base kimono. Over the years many of the conventions of femininefashionwereinventedintheflowerandwillowworld, andthenabandonedbythegeishasocietywhentheyentered the mainstream. The profession of the geisha has survived intothetwenty-firstcenturybyevolvingintosomethingquite differentthanwhatithadoncebeen.Onceculturalinnovators, today geisha are caretakers of traditions of Japanese classical music, dance, manners, and fashion.

Although the Sicilian coastline inspired Dolce and Gabanna’s collection, there were remarkable characteristicsthathintedtowards the silhouette of an Asian Kimono, especially the sleeves. The boxy, structured shape of the sleeves in some garments allowed for a very masculine strong cut, however, other garments simply drew Gabriele Colangelo SS13, Sportmax SS13, Gabriele Colangelo SS13 attention to the sleeves in a very feminine way. All in all though, Dolce and Gabanna managed to take the Asian influence and translate it into strictly Dolce and Gabanna, making the garments scream Italy, and allowed for the designers to take all credit for creativity.

N21 SS13, Gianfranco Ferre SS13, N21 SS13, N21 SS13 Still hinting towards the emphasis on the sleeves, N21 and Gianfranco Ferre took note of the minimalism involved with the delicacy of the kimono sleeves, and turned them into feminine masterpieces, which were highlighted through the use of the embellishments in N21’s case, and the subtle satin sheer used in Ferre’s look. Truly, garments every woman would want as arm candy. It’s Milan’s high fashion injected with Giesha elements and a classic East meets West fusion of couture fabrics.

Dolce and Gabanna SS13 If being a modern Geisha allows one to impersonate them through spectacular clothing, then I don’t see why anyone would choose to be anything else. All designers truly used a modern twist on the sleeve emphasis, and made all looks emulate that of a powerful woman. Want to out-do yourself and truly become a head to-toe geisha? Invest in Prada for the spring. K

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EDUCATI

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The TR technique is an approach to pattern cutting that incorporates the ability to manipulate intuitively and artistically and specifically innovatively for fashion designers. By Luke Ronin In September 24 & 25, the Center for Pattern Design will present Shingo Sato, a fashion designer famous for his Transformational Reconstruction (TR) approach to pattern design, at the California College for the Arts in San Francisco.

Mr. Sato will will offer a unique Master Class in designing and developing the complex pattern techniques for his Ribbon Skirt, leading participants through his unusual design process in which he designs directly on the form.

Beginning with the muslin shell of the silhouette, Mr. Sato adds fullness, decorative details, seaming and the best fit, all as he works directly on the figure.

This process was learned when he began his design career with Azzedine Alaia in Paris and it can be used whether working for a custom client or with a standard size for limited multiple production.

In the Ribbon Skirt Class Master Class, he explains his special inset technique, taking participants from developing the design on the form to finishing the skirt in a fashion fabric in the weekend class. Thereafter, designers will be able to apply this technique to bodice and dress designs or just to a sleeve, for example. Along with the special design-on-the-form process are the secrets to cutting and stitching curves of the inset fabric while also incorporating the shaping normally handled by darts and seams.

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The finished garment seems a mystery in that no means of fitting is visible. The Ribbon Skirt is the design that elicited the most wonder from students at his introductory appearance in North America last spring. The Master Class is a fully integrated designing, draping, flat-pattern and sewing series of lessons all applied to a single garment.

The cult fashion world has been captivated recently by a series of YouTube videos showing the sculpted magic of Shingo

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2013 Sato and his TR techniques in fashion design. Working in Milan for ‘alta moda’ designers, Shingo Sato has taken his technical experience with Alaia to new design frontiers as he builds, ‘dismantles’ and rebuilds his designs into futuristic shapes, optical illusions and mind-bending fabric transitions.

He combines the complexity of origami, couture draping, flat pattern design and flawless construction to ‘persuade’ fabrics and seaming to perform unexpected effects as they flow around the body. Mr. Sato teaches extensively in Milan and Tokyo and his techniques are described in his new book and CD, Transformational Reconstruction, which he will sign upon request.

Further information is available or tickets for the Master Classes may be purchased online at the Center for Pattern Design.

The Center for Pattern Design strives to bring new understanding and appreciation for the art and craft of pattern

design in the creation of innovative fashion. CFPD offers classes, tours, books, tools, patterns and a monthly newsletter. The Center often collaborates with colleges and universities to bring educational opportunities to new generations of fashion professionals, instructors and students.

Shingo Sato plans to make his first visit to Southeast Asia on March 20th by visiting Singapore first. He will be holding his ‘Transformationl Reconstruction’ workshop at Marina Bay Sands ArtScience Museum.

He is excited as he has never been to Singapore yet. He has heard that there are a lot of aspiring designers here in Singapore and he would like to share his knwoledge and experiences in Milan to these enthuastic and talented students. K

SHINGO SATO WILL BE HAVING HIS WORKSHOP IN SINGAPORE ON MARCH 20! CATCH HIM AT MARINA BAY SANDS! VISIT WWW.SISTIC.COM.SG FOR INFO & TICKETS.

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LAFORET HARAJUKU 1-11-6 JINGUMAE, SHIBUYA-KU, TOKYO 150-0001

www.nicopanda.co.jp