Streetwear: Japan

STREETWEAR STREETWEAR STREE WEAR STREETWEAR STREETWEAR TREETWEAR STREETWEAR STREETW AR STREETWEAR STREETWEAR STR REETWEAR STREETWEAR JAPAN ST WEAR STREETWEAR STREETWEAR THE HISTORY OF JAPANESE STREET FASHION AND IT'S MOST INFLUENTIAL FIGURES.

STREETWEAR JAPAN

THE HISTORY OF JAPANESE STREET FASHION AND IT'S MOST INFLUENTIAL FIGURES.

CONT STREET WEAR JAPAN

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What is streetwear?

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THE GODFATHER OF STREETWEAR

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THEY CAME FROM NOWHERE

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PLANET OF THE BATHING APES

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UNDERCOVER MAKING NOISE

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WHAT IS STREETWEAR?

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DEFINING STREETWEAR Streetwear is a style of road fashion established in Californian surf and skate culture. It has developed to envelop components of hip hop design, Japanese street form, and present day high fashion mold. In 2011, Complex Magazine named Stüssy, Supreme and A Bathing Ape as the best streetwear brands. Streetwear regularly fixates on “easygoing, agreeable pieces, for example, pants, shirts, baseball tops, and shoes”.

Streetwear was originally revealed in 1980 by Los Angeles surfers, skateboarders and hiphop audiences. The reason for this style became so popular is to look contrary but elegant. Of course, at that time, such products were not considered luxury and did not even seem to be a profitable investment by any brand. Therefore, young people started to create their own style by making different combinations of sports products they bought. Sometimes they even produced products themselves.

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“STREETWEAR IS ABOUT CULTURE.

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IT IS NOT ABOUT CLOTHING.”

BOBBY HUNDREDS

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T-SHIRTS & SELECTIVENESS Luxury brands such as Supreme, A Bathing Ape and Stüssy, which we know today, were not a clothing brand at that time. When Streetwear became famous, Shawn Stussy started producing and selling T-shirts for the Streetwear style. Stüssy’s turn into select deals solidified the benchmark meaning of streetwear: taking “a multi-faceted, subculturally differing, Southern California way of life based T-shirt mark and [mimicking] the restricted feel of a top of the line extravagance brand... Those are the two most necessary parts of what makes a brand streetwear: T-shirts and selectiveness.”

Early streetwear brands took motivation from the DIY stylish of punk, new wave, substantial metal and later hip bounce societies. Set up sportswear and design brands connected themselves to the rising mid 1980s hip-hop scene, for example, Kangol and Adidas. The mid to late 90’s saw the expert American games establishments hugy affect the look of the scene, from the Los Angeles Raiders and Chicago Bulls tops and coats in the ahead of schedule to the larger than usual group pullovers.

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HIROSHI FUJIWARA HIROSHI FUJIWARA HIROSHI FUJIWA

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ARA HIROSHI FUJIWARA HIROSHI FUJIWARA HIROSHI Japan’s preeminent tastemaker, Hiroshi Fujiwara is the pinnacle of Japanese streetwear. A culture fanatic bar none, Fujiwara travelled the world to discover clothes, music and the relationship between the two. An indispensable link between Tokyo and the West, Fujiwara became the country’s greatest trend forecaster, with an unprecedented understanding of both local style and how the West would inevitably impact his native Japan. A pivotal figure in the Harajuku scene, he justly earned his reputation as the “Godfather of Streetwear” by setting the template for commoditizing youth culture. Through his company, Fragment Design, he has had the opportunity to collaborate with many of the world’s most recognized brands—helping eliminate the discrepancy between streetwear and high-fashion in the process. Today, Fragment’s double lightning bolt logo is a certified stamp of approval, worth its weight in gold. More than three decades into his career, Fujiwara continues his frenetic pace, now disrupting street fashion on a global scale as one of its most respected figures.

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INTRODUCING HIP-HOP TO TOKYO EARLY LIFE Hiroshi Fujiwara was born and raised in the quaint coastal city of Ise, Mie in 1964.

He moved to Tokyo at the age of eighteen and immersed himself in the city’s music and fashion scenes. As a teen, Fujiwara fell in love with Punk Rock which inevitably led him to London. While there, he got the chance to meet the legendary Malcolm McLaren, manager of The Sex Pistols and co-founder (alongside Vivienne Westwood) of SEDITIONARIES. McClaren told Fujiwara that he found London boring at the moment and that he should instead visit New York. Fujiwara soon made the trip across the pond where he was introduced to hip-hop. A local friend lead Fujiwara to The Roxy Theatre where he discovered genre pioneers Afrika Islam and Kool Lady Blue and immediately fell in love. Fujiwara started ferrying American records back to Tokyo, and in doing so became a vital link between American hip-hop and the emerging scene in Tokyo. He learned to DJ, playing sets across Tokyo and introducing a new generation to the genre and even formed a hip-hop group, Tiny Panx with several friends.

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THE INTERNATIONAL TRIBE In contrast to Japan’s most prestigious designers—Rei Kawakubo, Yohji Yamamoto and Issey Miyake—Fujiwara was more interested in street and vintage clothing than Parisian runways. While hip-hop and skateboarding were still barely connected at the time, Fujiwara sought a way to marry all of his divergent interests together. He thought he could transform his eclectic taste in music and clothes into a broader youth-oriented lifestyle. His vision began to take shape after a chance meeting with Shawn Stussy while on a trip to the US. The Stüssy founder made Fujiwara an honorary member of the Worldwide Stüssy Tribe, an honor that resulted in him getting shipped boxes of free Stüssy product to wear and distribute amongst his friends in Tokyo.

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“I’d met Shawn in Japan through the surf-culture people I knew. We hung out one night, and he said, “Okay, Hiroshi, I’ll send you a box.”

I had no idea what he meant. But about two weeks later, a huge box full of Stüssy clothes arrived. I was really happy—and surprised—so I started wearing his stuff, and that was the beginning of the International Stüssy Tribe. I guess Shawn was mailing out packages to other guys he knew in places like New York and London. I was the one in Tokyo.

What I really liked about Stüssy was that it wasn’t the usual surf-culture gear or style. I think it was really inspired by labels like Chanel and Comme des Garçons—like black shirts with a certain kind of buttons.

I was very into it.”

HIROSHI FUJIWARA

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LAST ORGY: THE GOSPEL TO THE YOUTH Fujiwara’s success is best explained by his endless connections in increasingly disparate disciplines. In the early ‘90s, the nascent state of the internet meant that information (particularly pertaining to street culture) was primarily transferred by magazines and word of mouth. Given his constant travels, Hiroshi became the link between Japan and the West. Frequent trips to the London, Paris, New York and Los Angeles provided Fujiwara a global network of friends and conspirators. He began to chronicle his travels in local magazines, most notably his column “Last Orgy” in Takarajima. A guide to the latest trends in street culture—which Fujiwara picked up from his travels abroad—“Last Orgy” recommended everything from skateboards and clothes to DJ equipment. The column was gospel to Japanese youth and lead to a regular feature in Popeye titled “Last Orgy 2.”

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GOOD ENOUGH GOODENOUGH (or GDEH) was conceived in 1990 when graphic designer and later founder of C.E, SK8THING, floated the idea of creating premium graphic tees to Fujiwara.

Having gained recognition as one of the first freelance DJs in Japan, Fujiwara had already become the point man for Western imports into a cultural scene that was ravenous for new sources of inspiration. Speaking to Interview Magazine, Fujiwara explained, “In those days, people were really hungry for information—and, somehow, I had pretty good access because I had friends in London, New York, Los Angeles, everywhere. I’d been visiting many places and talking with people, so I had a constant flow of new info. I sometimes did articles for magazines and things, and people started to say, ‘If you want to know what’s going on, ask Hiroshi.’”

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Hiroshi Fujiwara wearing a GOODENOUGH mouton jacket in the October 1999 issue of Street Jack magazine.

After the Americana-centric Shibukaji subculture of neighboring Shibuya district, Tokyo’s youth were eager for a new cultural wave and almost immediately latched onto the homegrown, filtered aesthetic espoused by GDEH. Rapidly attracting a cult following, the brand was not so much concerned with youthful rebellion against the strict, patriarchal Japanese hierarchy, but was instead adopted as a form of self-expression. However, it was not known for many years after its founding who was behind the brand — a masterful stroke by its creator. As Fujiwara later explained, “If I attached my name to the brand, only people who liked me would buy it.

They wouldn’t be able to see the clothes for what they were.”

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Goodenough Fall/Winter 2015

For his new label, Fujiwara took inspiration from the likes of Stussy and England’s Anarchic Adjustment and, in showcasing a skill that he would later become renowned for, went on to deftly mix and match the surf and BMX influences of these brands along with his own hip-hop background to create a palatable aesthetic packaged for budding Japanese tastes in streetwear.

GDEH’s early designs thus featured pop culture-inspired graphics that drew on everything from Nascar emblems and psychedelic illustrations of Karl Marx, to repurposing the distinctive logos of Lonely Planet and cult ’80s-era surfwear brand Life’s A Beach.

The brand also preceded the bomber and varsity jacket trends by several years, with the rare GDEH collector’s items popping up every now and then on Japan’s Yahoo Auctions.

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From there on out, GDEH continued to operate under Fujiwara’s oversight, briefly opening a boutique in London under the GOODENOUGH U.K. label, a diffusion label called RESONATE GOODENOUGH in 2004, a West Coast preppy-influenced label called GOODENOUGH IVY in 2013, and more recently, a Stateside capsule collection with UNDEFEATED earlier this summer. However, Fujiwara himself gradually lost interest in the brand that had started it all towards the end of the ’90s.

“I decided that this is not what I should be doing. I didn’t want to make a big company and have to hire lots of people,” he explained. “I felt like I was better as an independent or as a solo operator. So I made the decision to finish everything and work alone just with an assistant or two and just change to a design studio that sells ideas to other companies for a percentage or a guarantee. Although maybe there isn’t the potential that there is in having a bigger company, it’s good for me.”

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Having firmly established his reputation as the “Godfather of Streetwear,” Fujiwara would go on to helm influential projects such as Nike’s hallowed HTM collaboration with Mark Parker and Tinker Hatfield, as well as collaborating with Levi’s on its Fenom line, among others. And despite losing the creative capabilities of its founder, the brand holds an inalienable spot as a pioneer within Japanese streetwear for its success in injecting style and flow into a fashion industry that had anything but. Commenting on the brand’s phenomenon, former Stüssy creative director Paul Mittleman succinctly says, “I think the simple ideology of GOODENOUGH was appropriate – the majority of what was around was simply not ‘good enough.’”

Regardless of its future fortunes within the fickle streetwear industry, GDEH wasn’t merely good enough — it was the precursor to a worldwide style revolution.

THE GODFATHER OF STREET WEAR

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FRAGMENT DESIGN Today, Fujiwara’s seal of approval is a double lightning bolt, the logo for his brand Fragment Design. Despite the barebones three man team, the company has an outsize influence on street fashion and culture worldwide. Why the meager operation may seem ill-equipped to work with some of the biggest names in fashion, Fujiwara explains it as such: “Some people work like a band, some work like an orchestra—I work solo.”

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I WORK SOLO.” 31

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FRAGMENT COLLABORATIONS From designer fashion to mass-market consumer products, Fragment Design has worked with everyone from Louis Vuitton and Moncler to Levi’s, Starbucks and Pokemon. Fragment’s seemingly disparate partners, unconventional design approach and unpredictable partnerships is reflected by its equally puzzling website, featuring glitchy video artwork

by Fujiwara. Titles like “Capitalism Brought By Communism” and “This Machine Kills Fascists” flash across the screen—ironic considering how co-branded Fragment products tend to fly off of store shelves. Fujiwara’s approach to collaboration is based around personal relationships more so than brands themselves. Fujiwara evaluates each collaboration based around who’s controlling the partnership and how easy it will be to work with one another. Fujiwara prefers to establish an atmosphere of mutual respect and like-minded attitudes before proceeding.

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CONTRIBUTION TO THE CULTURE

With an innate understanding of the current cultural zeitgeist, Fujiwara is acutely aware of what is currently missing, and how he can contribute. Explaining Fujiwara’s skill set, Fraser Cooke—global director of influencer marketing and collaborations at Nike—said, “Hiroshi has remained relevant for so long because he has good taste and a very acute sense of timing—he’s good at partnering with the right people at the right time.” These people and partnerships were compiled into Hiroshi Fujiwara: Fragment, a comprehensive history of the creatives work published by Rizzoli in 2014. The hardcover book, chronicles over thirty years of Fujiwara’s life, with sections on his artwork, graphics, sneakers, product design and curated personal effects. Over the book’s 200 plus pages, Fujiwara’s immense contribution to the culture is painfully clear.

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HTM AIR FORCE I ‒ The glossy croc-embossed leather underscores the premium status of Air Force I. The Nike Swoosh embellishes the tongue and heel, while the HTM logo adorns the toe and the insole, and the Fragment logo appears on the side of the heel. Introduced in 2004.

A DESIGNER

Fujiwara’s philosophy is dictated by his idea that “a designer is not a designer anymore.” Fujiwara disrupts the expected in order to invigorate customers, his relationship with Nike a perfect example. The H in Nike HTM, the long-term collaboration without traditional deadlines or budget constraints between Fujiwara, Tinker Hatfield and Mark Parker is one of the most celebrated in Nike’s history. With over 30 products released during its tenure, HTM has a proven track record of disrupting the sneaker industry with original silhouettes and unexpected twists on classic.

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IS NOT A DESIGNER ANYMORE 37

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THE LEGACY CONTINUES

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Fujiwara’s enthusiasm for product ultimately derives from his direct relationship to the culture that inspires it. Armed with a first-hand account of then burgeoning punk and hip-hop scenes, Fujiwara helped shape the notion of modern streetwear as we know it. Fujiwara’s taste level cannot be replicated because while others reference sub-cultures or specific eras, he lived them. In our current era, where information is easily accessible online and actual experience is in short supply, his expertise has only become more valuable. Fujiwara’s formula is equal parts rebellion and innovation. He finds what makes a product or experience so appealing, and bolsters those aspects, while adding an element of surprise. It’s this balance between refinement and experimentation that makes Fujiwara such a gifted creative force. Despite all his accolades and accomplishments to date, he continues to operate at a fierce pace that shows few signs of slowing. He very much is the “Godfather of Streetwear,” and it seems unlikely he will pass the torch anytime soon.

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“People think that streetwear is sneaker culture, but I think it’s more than that... it’s about the attitude you have.”

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NOW & HERE: NOWHERE The ‘90s saw the emergence of Stussy as a mainstream brand and Supreme as a force within New York’s downtown scene. As American streetwear brands built their empires, so did a young generation of streetwear designers from Japan. Within the greater Japanese fashion industry, a particular area held strong influence: Urahara. The neighborhood was home base for those who ultimately would become the leaders of Japanese streetwear.

Brands like A Bathing Ape, Bounty Hunter, Undercover, WTAPS and Neighborhood owe much of their success to Urahara and the community that grew around it. Always educating the next generation, Fujiwara launched the career of two of Japan’s most celebrated designers when he helped Jun Takahashi and NIGO open seminal streetwear Harajuku boutique NOWHERE in 1993.

The original store was the first place to sell both Undercover and BAPE and it’s unique reputation and product mix gives it a legendary status in the streetwear world to this day.

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THE HIDDEN HARAJUKU A URAHURA TALE To properly recognize the role that NOWHERE played in the culture, it helps to understand the neighborhood that served as the scene’s incubator.

Urahara is short for ura-Harajuku, meaning “the hidden Harajuku.” Just a few square blocks nestled between Harajuku and Aoyama, the area is characterized by its back alleys and side streets. Today, Urahara has become fully commercialized and is home to retail giants such as Burberry, Paul Smith and Uniqlo. While the area has retained some of its original character, it’s a far cry from the independent bohemian vibe of the ‘90s.

Back then, the neighborhood was home to plenty of independent boutiques, many of which specialized in vintage clothing or items that catered to hip-hop and punk collectors. This made the area a natural meeting place for like-minded youth who valued music, gear and expressing their personal style through specialized clothing and hobbies.

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Young Takahashi and Nigo during the Nowhere days.

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Takahashi and Nigo need little introduction at this point in their careers. The two have ascended to icon status, each leading their respective style cult. Both men met in 1990 while studying at Tokyo’s Bunka fashion college, quickly becoming friends through their shared interest in music and fashion. Takahashi and Nigo spent much of their time in school hitting clubs and concerts in Tokyo, their friendship turning professional when they opened NOWHERE on April 1, 1993. The store was the first place Undercover was ever carried, with selected pieces designed to sell at launch. It was also around this time that A Bathing Ape was conceived, in conjunction with Nigo’s friend and frequent collaborator, SK8THING. BAPE was released at NOWHERE later that same year.

In a 2009 Silly Thing interview, Nigo reflected on the experience saying that NOWHERE was opened with a meager budget of just 400,000 Japanese Yen (about $4000USD today). The store was stocked with mostly items sourced from America: new designs, vintage and deadstock trainers and Undercover.

The name NOWHERE itself was derived from the song “Nowhere Man” by the Beatles and as a noticeably present phrase from the Sex Pistols’ artwork, another of Takahashi and Nigo’s beloved bands.

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NOWHERE’S LEGACY After its height, NOWHERE went through some defining changes. The shop moved from its original Harajuku location to Aoyama. The store ended up closing entirely in 2000, with Takahasi and Nigo going on to create their own respective retail ventures, with NOWHERE’s legacy both legitimized and romanticized in retrospect.

Clearly, NOWHERE was a focal point to the rise of Urahara style throughout Japan and beyond. The same American style that was popular there, is still a major defining factor in what streetwear is today. One only has to look at street style shots from Paris to Milan to see it’s continued lineage. As pioneers of the Urahara scene, Nigo and Takahashi were able to usher in a new genre of streetwear; one that emphasized strong storytelling and subcultural references.

As new Japanese brands take the torch from the old guard, it’s clear that nothing has quite filled the void that NOWHERE left and arguably never will.

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“Back in the day, Harajuku was all about vintage shopping and vintage retailers. With the influx of brands and concepts such as NOWHERE, I think we helped changed the environment of Harajuku and ushered in a new movement. Perhaps one that has become a bit of the central theme to the creative and independent aspect of Harajuku.�

TOMOAKI NIGO NAGAO

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TOMOAKI NAGAO TOMOAKI NAGAO TOMOAKI NAGAO TOM

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MOAKI NAGAO NIGO TOMOAKI NAGAO TOMOAKI NAGAO Tomoaki Nagao “Nigo” is a Japanese fashion designer, DJ, record producer and entrepreneur. He is best known as the creator of the urban clothing line A Bathing Ape, otherwise known as Bape.

Nigo has currently been associated with popular rap and hip hop artists such as Kanye West and Pharrell Williams. He is the DJ of the popular Japanese hip hop group Teriyaki Boyz and is also owner of BAPE sounds record label. He currently has a show he created himself for MTV Japan called Nigoldeneye. Nigo’s influence goes deep in the intertwined hip-hop and streetwear culture his predecessor Hirsohi Fujiwara helped pioneer. He was given the name Nigo which means “number two” after his uncanny similarities in looks and interests with Fujiwara.

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EARLY LIFE The son of a nurse and billboard maker, Tomaki Nagao’s parents often worked a lot, leaving him alone with his toys as a child, where he developed a fondness for pop culture franchises like Star Wars. As a teenage clothing nerd going to high school in Maebashi, the capital of Japan’s mountainous Gunma prefecture, he idolized Hiroshi Fujiwara. As outlined in W. David Marx’s Ametora, Nagao read Fujiwara’s “Last Orgy” column in Japanese mag Takarajima like the Bible. Fujiwara’s column espoused the distinct subcultural mix—hip-hop, fashion, punk, skate—that embodied the same wave of Shawn Stussy’s seminal International Stüssy Tribe, of which Fujiwara was a member. That granted him access to a burgeoning scene of global cool guys, linking up with legit influencers like Michael Koppleman and Fraser Cooke in London, as well as cultural vanguards Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood. In fact, it was McLaren who put Fujiwara off of his obsession with punk and new wave, and guided him towards New York’s fledgling hip-hop scene.

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Star Wars action figures from Nigo’s personal collection.

Nigo (right) for Cross Colours in the 90s.

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NIGO NUMBER TWO

Nigo and Hiroshi Fujiwara.

The eclectic cultural mix presented in “Last Orgy” blew Nagao’s post-pubescent mind, and inspired him to move to Tokyo to enroll at the prestigious Bunka Fashion College— where he didn’t study design, but rather a course meant for aspiring magazine editors. Then known as “Tomokun” to his friends, Nagao also happened to meet future UNDERCOVER designer Jun “Jonio” Takahashi at school.

Through a chance meeting at a club, a merchandiser for punk shop A Store Robot noticed the striking resemblance between Nagao and his idol, Hiroshi Fujiwara. So he nicknamed him “Fujiwara Hiroshi NIGO,” translated as “Fujiwara Hiroshi Number Two.” Obviously, the new moniker stuck.

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A BATHING APE IN LUKEWARM WATER BAPE NIGO realized his success hinged on creating his own label, and Sk8thing came up with the concept after binge-watching all five of the original Planet of the Apes films. So was borne the iconic Ape Head graphic, while the slogan “A Bathing Ape in Lukewarm Water” was lifted from underground comic artist Takashi Nemoto’s Monster Men Bureiko Lullaby, in which he describes an old man bathing as “like an ape in a bath of lukewarm water” which was a self-aware reference to the overindulgences of their generation. Truncating the name to “A Bathing Ape,” it eventually became known colloquially as the simpler “BAPE.”

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Nigo and Japanese Hip-Hop group Teriyaki Boyz.

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At first BAPE had more in common with the fabled yeti than the common primate it er—apes its name from. The goods were extremely limited, and extremely pricey.

There’s a popular shot of Biggie by Shawn Mortensen wearing a BAPE parka circa 1994, and word on the street is that it’s actually Mortensen’s own jacket draped over the rap legend. NIGO partnered up with indie Japanese hip-hop acts like Scha Dara Parr and the appropriately named Cornelius, who lifted his nom de mic off the very same Planet of the Apes marathon that birthed the brand. In addition to kicking off BAPE’s tradition of making tour merch, Cornelius was even part of the 1999 World Wide BAPE Heads show, which had its own exclusive set of merchandise.

The clothes had a playful utilitarian appeal. Drawing heavily from military motifs, Sk8thing designed A Bathing Ape’s popular camouflages, infusing the ape head into different types of disruptive pattern materials. Moving into the 2000s, the camo patterns got brighter, incorporating bright pastels and other colors that defeated the original subterfuge intent of the print. The same A-2 Warthog fighter jet images that inspired the Jordan V became the basis of BAPE’s full-zip shark hoodie, which had a zipper that went past the neck and to the hood, concealing the wearer’s face entirely.

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Chris Brown in a BAPE x Coca Cola collaboration.

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Robin Williams seen wearing a BAPE button up.

BAPE’s international exposure began proper when NIGO met legendary London music legend James Lavelle, who connected him with artists like DJ Shadow and NYC graffiti GOATs like Futura 2000 and Stash. The latter owned NYC street shop Recon, who was one of BAPE’s early American retailers, and sold through whatever limited stock they got their hands on as soon as it landed in the store.

By 1999, Marx writes that BAPE’s revenues were in the ballpark of 2 billion Yen, with six Busy Work Shops in Japan alone. Later that year, BAPE opened its first store in Hong Kong, and its growing popularity signaled to NIGO that his “exclusive” brand had a massive appeal. So instead of doing like his predecessors and other streetwear stalwarts and cutting down stockists and lowering production to retain an air of scarcity, he did the opposite. In the equivalent of your favorite indie band realizing they had the potential to sell out stadium shows, NIGO signed major label deals with brands like Pepsi, encasing soda cans with BAPE’s trademark camouflage, and rapidly expanding his business.

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Biggie Smalls wearing a BAPE zip-up jacket.

Photographer: Shawn Mortensen.

Kanye West and his BAPE collection.

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FADING FORTUNE At its peak, BAPE’s empire spanned a global set of stores, a cafe, an art gallery, and dedicated stores for other lines like cartoonish Babymilo gear, a women’s couture line Bapy, and a children’s wear store.

But by 2009, those fortunes were fading—fast. NIGO stepped down as the CEO. The Wall Street Journal reported that by 2010, BAPE lost 110 million yen.

So in a move that went down in streetwear history, Hong Kong-based I.T. Group bought a 90% stake in the company for a cool 230 million yen—or roughly $2.8 million. The number seems like a paltry sum, but Marx points out in his book that even though BAPE’s parent company Nowhere had revenues of about $62.5 million, their debts were at Kanye West levels of $52.79 million, which I.T. Group assumed as part of the deal.

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HUMAN MADE FOR FUTURISTIC TEENAGERS During his last days at the brand he created, NIGO was more focused on other pet projects. He created a fledgling label called Human Made for “futuristic teenagers” in mind with a more grown-up, vintage-inspired graphic language, and Mr. Bathing Ape, a proper menswear line that mixed Savile Row British tailoring traditions with BAPE’s trademark graphics. It made its online debut in 2011 on Mr Porter. He also has an ongoing collaboration with adidas and serves as the creative director of Uniqlo’s t-shirt program. You can thank him for the retailer’s recent KAWS collab. Other BAPE alumns went onto other projects: Toby Feltwell and Sk8thing are the current duo behind cult label Cav Empt, which draws its influences from military, workwear, and the digital dystopianism of Philip K. Dick.

But BAPE remains alive and kicking under its new corporate masters, and the irony isn’t lost on true BAPE heads that the guy currently terrorizing Supreme fans in favor of BAPE is essentially touting a soulless shell of itself over a genuinely independent brand that never lost its focus or got too big for its britches. Best case scenario, BAPE will follow in the footsteps of Stussy—appropriate considering how closely the brands are linked—and find a balance between leveraging its underground heritage and the fact that it has become the very type of commercial brand it was founded against.

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JUN TAKAHASHI JUN TAKAHASHI JUN TAKAHJUN TAKA

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AHASHI JUN TAKAHASHI JUN TAKAHASHI JUN TAKAH In the melting pot that is streetwear, certain designers and labels often lean on certain subcultures. Shawn Stussy, for example, started out in West Coast surf culture. Supreme’s roots are in skateboarding. BAPE brought cartoonish Japanese aesthetics and a love of hip-hop. But when it comes to punk rock, you have to turn to Jun Takahashi and his label UNDERCOVER driven by the motto “We make noise, not clothes.” Takahashi translates the subversion and disruption of punk rock into fashion, like an heir of Malcolm McLaren and Vivienne Westwood, with his blend of bondage, gothic, baroque, and grotesque aesthetics embodying the spirit of rebellion in fashion.

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EARLY LIFE Takahashi was born in 1969, in the Japanese city of Kiryū. He reached adolescence during the 1980s, at a time when Japan had become well and truly infatuated with western culture. During this period, Japanese youths – Takahashi included – were drawn to the defiant sounds and aesthetics that defined the punk and hip hop genres. He became enamoured with the punk scene, embracing the rebellious attitudes and fashions flaunted by the likes of the Sex Pistols and Vivienne Westwood.

His love for Johnny Rotten and Co. grew so strong that, at one point, Takahashi wound up as the lead singer of a cover band called the ‘Tokyo Sex Pistols’. With an appreciation for the punk scene’s unconventional fashion burning strong, Takahashi decided to take his passion to the next level in 1988 by enrolling into Japan’s now-legendary Bunka Fashion College: an establishment that has served as a vital stepping stone in the careers of countless fashion design designer, including Junya Watanabe and Yohji Yamamoto to name a few.

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PUNK INSPIRED BAD BOY Takahashi founded Undercover while still a student at Tokyo’s Bunka Fashion College. Along with Nigo, the duo’s opening of Nowhere in 1993 became the first showcase of Takahashi’s talent. Takahashi was less than pleased with the formal education that Bunka had to offer. He was vocally dismissive of the knowledge offered by his teachers – given they were significantly older than Takahashi and their concept of style was rooted in tradition – leading him to believe that they had little to offer of value in terms of subjective opinion. With Takahashi willing to concentrate only on the practical teachings that Bunka had to offer, he and Nigo could be found spending much of their time outside of class frequenting local concerts and nightclubs.

More than two decades onward, a picture of Nowhere’s unassuming storefront—ground zero for the second wave of Japanese fashion influence around the world—is as affecting as a snapshot of a baby-faced Takahashi, hair bleached blond and grimacing for the camera: a would-be London bad boy and actual punk band frontman, but hardly, one assumes, the future head of a small but influential global fashion enterprise. Takahashi conceived Undercover together with fellow Bunka classmate Hinori Ichinose after having been inspired by the work of Commes des Garçons.

Undercover’s debut offerings consisted of vintage apparel that was distressed and modified with a heavy dose of punk inspiration.

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WE MAKE NOISE, NOTUNDERCOVER CLOTHES.

Jun Takahashi’s label Undercover is a rare beast. Equally revered as a cult name in streetwear and as a fixture on Paris’ high fashion calendar, it is as if Supreme and Chanel were a single entity, injected with a dose of Tokyo underground. Complicating matters, ambiguity has defined the Undercover aesthetic from the start. Perhaps because Takahashi founded his label right as Japan’s economic bubble began to burst, his creations have always evinced, along with strength and ingenuity, an inescapable notion of precarious instability. In today’s uncertain climate, the designer’s beautiful mix of chaos, resolve, fragility, peace, and humor is more relevant and necessary than ever.

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ANARCHY FOREVER FOREVER ANARCHY 10 78

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AFFA

By 1996, the Nowhere’s newfound celebrity status was made clear, when Asayan’s readers selected NOWHERE as their favorite store.

Readers also chose Takahashi as one of their favourite celebrities, alongside Fragment Design founder Hiroshi Fujiwara. Prior to this, Takahashi and Fujiwara had formed a collaborative label named AFFA – short for ‘ANARCHY FOREVER FOREVER ANARCHY’. The brand went all in on the ‘70s punk aesthetic, but with a dose of inspiration from the 90s. Each item released by the brand was either handmade or custom made in small numbers, explaining why it never received the same mainstream acclaim as either collaborator’s individual projects.

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MEETING REI KAWAKUBO Fujiwara wasn’t the only acclaimed designer significant in Takahashi’s early career. Also in 1994, he presented his first women’s runway show at Tokyo Fashion Week, where his work caught the attention of Comme des Garçons founder Rei Kawakubo. The acclaimed designer was an early fan of Takahashi’s work and, after much back-and-forth correspondence, she ended up taking him under her wing. She served as a mentor to Takahashi, helping him to evolve the brand’s style towards the refined aesthetic it is known for today. At the recommendation of Rei Kawakubo, Takahashi traveled to France in 2002 to present Undercover at Paris Fashion Week, which caused its popularity to skyrocket – a significant moment in establishing the brand’s global appeal.

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Nike x Comme des Garรงons x Undercover x Off-White collaborative sneaker.

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“WE’RE HUMAN BEINGS – PERFECTION IS NOT COOL.” Plenty of fashion labels have explored the bond between style and music, but few designers have understood that connection quite like Takahashi.

UNDERCOVER took the spirit of punk and translated it into something wearable. His work is more than just an aestheticized homage or late-’70s time capsule, it recontextualizes a subculture into something crisp, contemporary, and flawlessly stylish. The word “punk” is thrown around a lot with regard to Undercover, and while it’s an obvious reference, the term is too reductive to fully encapsulate the whole breadth of Takahashi’s darkly enchanting, rebellious, and often bizarre imagination. Like a safety pin through a jacket lapel, Takahashi’s dedication to punk’s legacy connects him directly to Vivienne Westwood and everything she helped kick-start.

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COLOPHON All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission of the copyright owners. Every effort has been made to ensure that credits accurately comply with information supplied. I apologize for any inaccuracies that may have occured and will resolve in innaccurate or missing information in a subsequent reprinting of the book.

Streetwear: Japan was designed and typeset by Rolando Etorma II in San Francisco, California. Digital type composition, page layouts, and type design utilized Adobe InDesign CC 2019. Images belong to their respective owners. Images were edited on Adobe Photoshop CC 2019.

Academy of Art University. Instructor: Jessica Peltz.

The typefaces applied to this book are Dharma Gothic C Bold, Dharma Gothic M Bold, Dharma Gothic M Thin, Nimbus Sans Light, and Nimbus Sans Black.

Printed and bound by Blurb, an online publishing service.

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