Japan and the West: 11

Fashion and Architecture

Outline

Practical Arts

Fashion

Architecture

衣食住 (i-shoku-ju)

Outline

Practical Arts

Fashion

Architecture

衣食住 (i-shoku-ju)

Fashion

Meiji-Taisho Period

1970s

Kansai Yamamoto

1980s

Issey Miyake

Kawakubo Rei

Street Fashion

Mix and match

Early Adopters...

“The undignified billy-cocks and pantaloons of the West are slowly but

surely supplanting the picturesque, aristocratic-looking native garb, a

change for which

the Government is mainly responsible, as it

obliges almost all officials to wear European

dress when on duty […]

In the year 1886, some evil counsellor induced the Court to order gowns

from [...] Berlin likewise corsets, and those European shoes […] In vain

the local European press cried out against the barbarism, in vain every

foreigner of taste endeavoured privately to persuade his Japanese

friends not to let their wives make guys of themselves. […] on the 1st

November, 1886, the Empress and her ladies appeared in their new

German dresses at a public entertainment.”

Things Japanese, BH Chamberlain 1904

Rokumeikan Era (1880s)

Dancing at the Rokumeikan

Empress Shoken

“Since then there has been a

wave of reaction, in

consequence of which most

ladies have happily returned to

the national costume. How

charming it is to see a bevy of

them thus dressed, dressed, mind

you, not merely having clothes on,

such a symphony of greys and

browns and other delicate hues of

silk and brocade...”

(ibid.)

Dualism...

Domestic → Traditional

“Official” → Western

Within the 'Domestic' sphere...

Exterior → Western

Interior → Traditional

Moga & Mobo

Paul Poiret

1879 – 1944

Influential designer in France

in early c20

“King of Fashion” in the US

“Kimono Coat”

1930s

Madeleine Vionnet (1876-1976)

'Bias Cut'

Pleats / Grecian Dress

1940: “Big John”

Ozaki Kotaro's Maruo Clothing given rights to 50

rolls of imported US denim.

1972: Kurabo Mills produces first denim in Japan.

Kansai Yamamoto

David Bowie

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPvV

gFfwZTs

1972: Ziggy Stardust World Tour

A Japanese designer...

“Every artist has his own thing going

on. I often use Japanese motifs and

sometimes wonder if I’m choosing

them because I’m Japanese. Having

been all over the world and to

countries with various religious

backgrounds as much as I have, I

sometimes wonder where I’m really

from. I’m Japanese, so of course I

think of myself as Japanese, and I eat

Japanese food most of the time.”

2014 Interview in Vice Magazine - www.vice.com/read/some-cat-from-

japan-0000228-v21n2

BTW… Sukita Masayoshi

Born in Naogata, Fukuoka Pref (1935)

Worked in commercial photography

Photographed “T-Rex” (Marc Bolan)

Met Bowie in 1972

“Heroes” cover 1977

Kabuki meets

ukiyo-e meets

Bowie

Jonathan

Wakuda

Fischer

Fashion

Issey Miyake

Kawakubo Rei

Issey Miyake

After graduating in graphic design from

Tama Univ. (1965) moved to Paris.

Influenced by sculptors (Brancusi,

Giacometti)

Fashion inspirations included Vionnet

who “really understood the kimono”

New York → Tokyo

While taking English lessons

worked for Geoffrey Beene

“Godfather of American

Minimalism”

1970 returns to Tokyo to set up

Miyake Design Studio (MDS)

Influence of kimono

Importance of fabric -

texture, surface, form

Attempt to create clothes

without cutting fabric

'Rejecting the idea that

there is one way to wrap a

body in certain piece of

cloth'

Pleats Please

Collection launched in 1993, emerged from

design work for dancers in Frankfurt Ballet,

thus often uses dancers instead of models...

A-POC

• 1998: A Piece of Cloth

“There's no right or wrong

way of wearing it” -

“they're your clothes”

80% of sales in Japan

Origami clothes

“132 5”

collection

launched in

2010

2D→3D

Concern with

minimising

'waste'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gdxhNnytSs

Comme des Garçons

Kawakubo Rei

Est'd 1969/70 in Tokyo

Paris store opened 1980

Rejects conventional

gender roles and traditional

notions of beauty and

glamour

Yohji Yamamoto

Black…

“asymmetrical, oversized,

deconstructed, with exposed

seams, loose-fitting, and

overall a slap in the face to

the traditional idea that

women needed to be

constricted inside of tight,

perfectly tailored gowns”

• deconstructionism

KR: “Many designers cater to

the idea of what they think men

would like to see women as.”

http://paintingbohemia.org/culturalstudies/genders-sexualities/black-crows-how-rei-kawakubo-revolutionized-fashion-and-beauty/

1997: “Body meets dress, dress

meets body”

Clothing as

'burden'

Kawakubo everywhere...

2008 – H&M open in Tokyo

“Kawaii”

“Kawaii”

Dress: early c18

Architecture

Kyoto National Museum, 1895.

Katayama Tōkuma: grad. Imp.College of Tech. 1879

The Rokumeikan

Designed by Josiah

Conder (Imp. College of

Tech.)

Built 1880-3

Fell out of use after

1890s, demolished in

1941.

The Ryounkaku

'skyscraper'

凌雲閣• Built 1890

• Design: W.K. Burton

• 69m tall

• 2 electric elevators

designed by Fujioka

Ichisuke (Toshiba)

• Destroyed by 1923 quake

Imperial College of Engineering

• Architectural program started in 1877

• Design & construction technologies

"The science of Architecture has been laid in our college

as one of the main professional branches of study and the

true principles of European Architecture is being here

taught with the view of learning their true principles in our

country..."Funakoshi Kinya

Imperial College of Engineering graduation thesis, 1883

Dualism...

Domestic → Traditional

“Official” → Western

Within the 'Domestic' sphere...

Exterior → Western

Interior → Traditional

Yasuoka Katsuya (保岡勝也)

“The use of the two different styles of materials and forms

led to series of domestic homes that reflected the fusion.

Japanized Small Western Homes was a catalogue that

presented Japanese families with houses that were built in

varying European styles, but still had some Japanese

aspects to its design. These houses were described as

"seven parts Western and three parts Japanese" as the

catalogues advertised houses that were "Swiss chalet",

"pure German", and other European styles.”

“MEIJI ARCHITECTURE AND THE EFFECT OF CROSS-CULTURAL EXCHANGE WITH THE WEST”

Christine Manzano Visita

日本化したる洋風小住宅 (1924)

Japanised Western Homes

日本化したる洋風小住宅 (1924)

Japanised Western Homes

Mitsubishi Bldg, Karatsu

1908

Imperial Hotel

3 storey wood and brick structure

Designed by Watanabe Yuzuru (after a German

design)

Completed 1890

Frank Lloyd Wright

Imperial Hotel: 2

Constructed 1919 – 1923

During constructing the 1922 Kanto quake finished

off the old Imperial Hotel nearby

FLW's Imp.Hotel used new quake-proofing

Water pool in front for fires

Copper roof (safer than heavy tiles)

Seismic separation joints

Tapered walls etc...

“Mayan Revivalist”

“Mayan Revivalist”

Decline and death...

Foundations gradually sank…

Damaged during WW2

Too few rooms (280) for a modern hotel

1967 demolished and replaced

Arch:Takahashi Teitaro

Meiji Mura (nr. Nagoya)

Koshien Kaikan

Mukogawa Joshi Daigaku 武庫川女子大学

Endo Arato

1929

Metabolists

• Kurokawa Kisho

Built from interlinked modular

capsules in 1972

Nr. Shinbashi, Tokyo

Concern with large scale city

planning and ideas of organic

growth and flexibility.

Included Kenzo Tange

Shizuoka Press Tower

Kenzo Tange

1966

Ginza, Tokyo

Future Cities...

Developed in late 1950s to

increasing pressure on

population of cities in Japan.

Utopian dreams halted with

economic slowdown in 1970s

Metabolism rediscovered...

“Resilient urbanism”

Attention to the city as an “ecosystem”

Flexibility and adaptability

Rem Koolhaas

CCTV Building, 2012

Beijing

Next Week...