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Tag "Junya Watanabe"

Opportunities to showcase the work of Junya Watanabe, the Japanese designer historically produced by the Maison Comme des Garçons, have been plentiful. He was among the illustrious guests at the Radical Fashion exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London back in 2001, which also inspired the homonymous publication.


Elements such as origami, metal detailing, and eco-leather are repeatedly used to create a strongly recognizable language that sits at the intersection of avant-garde cyber-metropolitan trends and the visual arts.

According to the philosophy established by the Japanese school—from Rei Kawakubo to Issey Miyake, Yohji Yamamoto, and others—the dress transcends its simple decorative function, of medium and filter for social representation, instead becomes a creative opportunity and a textile device of complex realization.

For the current Fall/Winter season, Watanabe’s patchworks of matter evoke the ostentatious yet irresponsible luxury of snake skin, but in his hands, everything is a construct. The shapes, innovative and sculptural, articulate poetics that stand in stark contrast to any vulgarity. Silhouettes expand, as seen in the ‘spatial’ coat, whose expertly balanced volume takes the form of a spiral cape made from faux leather sewn onto heavy wool melton. Alternatively, they soften in a more subdued version with dropped sleeves. The dry eco-leather dress, essentially a long vest that can be layered over simpler outfits, does not shy away from more explicit elements of femininity. Unmissable the denim, with the collaboration with Levi’s, deconstructed and recomposed following the theme of the season.

This bold rhythm is a symphony of high notes and more subdued tones, a laborious composition between everyday contexts far removed from boredom and more vibrant and expressive social events.

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The first change of temperatures allows us to finally experience the autumn season even outside of the online dimension ‘catalogue‘ and of the daily spaces of the store.

Now you can place the garments within the colors and atmospheres of the period, imagining them in their potential and transversal recombinations. Our tutor Sari, on a Sunday in November, leads us into passionate mix and match where you can discover, from new perspectives, different items of the seasonal assortment.

The fantastic Italian cashmere F-Cashmere – i.e. Fissore, historic brand of the most noble yarn – with different color blocks and surprisingly soft hand, accompanies a wide, rustic skirt in English Donegal by Ricorrrobe, Anglo-Japanese new-entry. They close the ensemble: a knitted hat made of acrylic, nylon and mohair by Chisaki – directly from Japan – and one of the nap Lak leather bags of the cheerful South Tyrolean Maison, Zilla.

 

And one more, the interpretation of Noir – Kei Ninomiya collection, the most classic winter, eternal heavy knit with braids and Lapp workmanship in a piece of more feminine portability, thanks to a wide development of the sleeves, of a complex high neck/hood and ideal proportions for voluminous skirts, such as that in waxed cotton tartan always proposed by Ricorrrobe. A cool polar hat, all moldable and the revisitation of the typical historical aviator jacket, squeezed and resumed with daring tailoring seams, by Junya Watanabe, celebrate a coming winter of international evocative recognizability.

To close our appointment, a mix and match that mixes together a unique piece of the Nuno-felt designer by Emanuela Rovida, in organic merino wool and silk, handmade and fused with painterly skills from natural colors of shrubs and territorial plants, completely reversible and wearable front and back, seamless, combined with a skirt by Marc Le Bihan, from the refined fabric of gauze and boiled wool, worked together with three-dimensional bubbles. To cover the exceptional quality of the garments, a Forme d’Expression coat with a daily taste, comfortable, in a mélange jersey with a vibrant and intense blue, reverberated by the dazzling glitter of a metallic leather briefcase.

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While the summer insists on its hottest manifestations, longing for holiday destinations, regenerating rhythms and locations, we return together to Sari with some outdoor shots.

An opportunity to observe, from other perspectives, lights and combinations the proposals of a catalog that is now close to welcoming the first autumn deliveries…Let’s go!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Many thanks to GART for the location and to Andrea Rossi for the photos

 

Accessoires by: Shoto (shoes and bags), Zilla (bags), Chisaki (hats).

Clothing by: Marc Le BihanAlbum di FamigliaDaniela GregisJunya WatanabeForme d’ExpressionShu MoriyamaMaria Calderara

 

 



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Photo by Pascal Maucuit

Photo by Pascal Maucuit

On a rainy Saturday morning in Paris, with the town still sleeping, we run to the venue hosting the parade of Junya Watanabe: the faculty of pharmacology at Rue de l’Observatoire, exactly at the opposite end of the metro stop to which we have to go in the evening also for Comme des Garçons.

The rain, the time and the hurry to look for the fastest way to reach our destination do not favor the good humor, until, once into the mighty faculty salon, we are not awakened by a loud rock. The rhythm spurs for attention, the fierce gait of the models drags the present into an inevitable, and personal, reflection on fashion, on its utility or emptiness, and above all, it generates a real, widespread and more than ever palpable perception of uncontrollable enthusiasm.

Junya Watanabe Fall/Winter 2017-2018

As if the world suddenly recapture each potential, the possible silhouettes projected on Junya Watanabe‘s future Fall/Winter incite that desire for change that is the vulnus itself of fashion and the radicalism with which the Japanese designer staggers it is thrilling.

Faithful to his own ‘cyber’ vision of contemporaneity, Watanabe assembles materials with his typical origami form, which on this occasion we can recognize in the circle: calf hair, black leather, leopard spots, all strictly in synthetic leather, studs and pailletes re-compose patch-works of cultures and epochs of costume history of the most experimental forms. Excess is the guiding thread of deformed decorative elements, which not only outline unusual aesthetics, but also become part of and modify the human physical structure. Caps like sculptures, multicolored textile wigs, lacking any romantic poetics and built to defend any hypothetical attack, tunics that amplify the circularity of the chakras, coats shaped around the feminine figure with asymmetrical spheres, possible ultra-modern armors against the advancement of the creative nothing.

Junya Watanabe Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Junya Watanabe Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Junya Watanabe Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Junya Watanabe Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Junya Watanabe Fall/Winter 2017-2018

Junya Watanabe Fall/Winter 2017-2018

But the excess is finally cleaned, made accessible in the showroom choices, revealing how far it can go and how it can be traced back to the hectic daily life but still it remains a visionary exercise of pure and extraordinary contemporary textile art.

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Dazed, Junya, Watanabe, SS16

Junya Watanabe Spring/Summer 2016 runway details, Dazed & Confused dazeddigital.com.

(Dress and necklace coming soon.)

We always brought to light the Junya Watanabe’s peculiar interpretative ability in establishing, in the form of dress, the predominant stresses of our time. Post-modern, cyber-punk, tailor-philosopher of an age crossed by very fast transformations, where, from collection to collection, plastics and brand new materials, parts of abandoned industrial landscapes, occurred, to give shape to his personal metabolization and to his interpretation of the contemporaneity.

For the Spring/Summer 2016 the Rei Kawakubo-Comme des Garçons’ favourite, still produced by the Japanese Maison, welcomed his public in an emblematic space of pressing social themes, the Musée de l’Histoire de l’Immigration of Paris.

Junya, Watanabe, Musèe, de, l'Immigration, SS2016

Il Musée de l’Histoire de l’Immigration of Paris on the cover of Junya Watanabe S/S 2016 lookbook.

An important clue, a sensitive container of the present restrictive instincts of a continent in a state of alert for the imposing migratory phenomenon of which is witness. A suggestion and also an invitation to change the prospective through which we perceive the present, from an emergency point of view to an enrichment one, the one that only a flow of people and therefore of culture could offer, as the time has been able to testify.

And it’s the most problematic and hot continent to be celebrated and evoked, translated by the usual Watanabe’s modern glance. African and electro sonorities go along on the runway with the vivaciousness of the colours and of the decorations: very warm reds or clear, intense blues; kaftans and zebra-stripes dresses, tunics and shirts, garments able to face the highest temperatures, but also able to prepare us for more relaxed and evolved holidays.

Junya, Watanabe, SS2016, Full, Fashion Show

Constant asymmetries, elliptic constructions, experimental leopard spots on Japanese paper and complex fabric movements at the hem bring Africa and its chromatic, formal and symbolic qualities into the metropolitan and stateless circuits, where any traditional aesthetic contaminate and regenerate itself in peculiar, as independent, anthropological expressions.

Junya, Watanabe, Metalic, Rings, Dress, SS16

Junya Watanabe long kaftan dress in light polyester canvas with horizontal stripes ‘décor’ style and aluminium bangles, wide crew-neck, wide flared sleeve, big metallic bangles on the cuffs detachable with laces and loops.

Junya, Watanabe, SS 2016, Black, and, White, Dress

Junya Watanabe zebra-striped dress coming soon.

Junya Watanabe multi-layers rings necklace from the bigger to the smaller in shiny polyurethane and polyester imitation leather, it could be placed along the shoulders.

Photography from Junya Watanabe S/S 2016 lookbook.

Junya, Watanabe, SS 2016, Black, Dress

Junya Watanabe asymmetric robe manteau dress in polyester organza with tone on tone small spots processing in Japanese paper, wide half-closed shirt neck, ¾ flared sleeve, buttons closure till the bottom, spiral construction.

Junya Watanabe 5 pockets jeans-like leggings in light stretch linen and polyurethane canvas, over-the-ankle length, zip and button closure, belt loops.

Massimo Giussani man shoe in cowhide leather entirely hand-painted with two colours one shading on the other, with laces and tongue with inner elastic band, leather sole painted in the same colours of the upper part.

Junya, Watanabe, SS2016, White, Shirt

Junya Watanabe long and wide shirt in light ramié canvas, raglan shoulder, long sleeve, sack line on the back and straight on the front.

A punto B long trousers in cotton poplin, elastic band and light curling at the band, welt vertical side pockets.

Massimo Giussani man shoe in cowhide leather entirely hand-painted with two colours one shading on the other, with laces and tongue with inner elastic band, leather sole painted in the same colours of the upper part.

Junya, Watanabe, SS16, Red, Shirt

Junya Watanabe long and wide shirt in light ramié canvas, raglan shoulder, long sleeve, sack line on the back and straight on the front.

A punto B wide linen canvas trousers, elastic band and light curling at the belt, welt vertical side pockets.

Classic’ Trippen ankle-length boot in soft elk leather with rounded tip, diagonal zip on the upper part, side zip closure, removable cork insole, rubber sole.

Junya, Watanabe, SS16, Blue, Shirt, Dress

Junya, Watanabe, SS2016, Blue, Dress, Back

Junya Watanabe wide tunic in light ramié canvas, shirt neck with half-closed closure, flared line with stiff band, sack shape with central upside down V stitching and on the back at the bottom.

Junya Waatanabe 5 pockets jeans-like leggings in light stretch linen and polyurethane canvas, over-the-ankle length, zip and button closure, belt loops.

Massimo Giussani man shoe in cowhide leather entirely hand-painted with two colours one shading on the other, with laces and tongue with inner elastic band, leather sole painted in the same colours of the upper part.

Junya, Watanabe, SS2016, Blue, Cotton, Dress

Junya Watanabe wide tunic in light cotton canvas, crew-neck with back small button, flared line with stiff band, sack shape with side stitching towards the inside at the bottom.

Junya Waatanabe 5 pockets jeans-like leggings in light stretch linen and polyurethane canvas, over-the-ankle length, zip and button closure, belt loops.

Massimo Giussani man shoe in cowhide leather entirely hand-painted with two colours one shading on the other, with laces and tongue with inner elastic band, leather sole painted in the same colours of the upper part.

 


 

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