BENGALURU: When the whole world of fashion was ruled by European designers, who very snobbishly refused to acknowledge that good design could come out of anywhere but Paris, Issey Miyake led a Japanese invasion that proved them very wrong. Till then, Paris and Milan were the very epicentres of haute couture, with the great houses of Dior, Yves St Laurent and Chanel matching the Italians who gave us Gucci, Valentino, Armani and Versace. Between them, they looked down their refined noses at the Americans, whom they refused to even acknowledge as capable of producing serious fashion, even though Halston was making an impact with American dowagers. In England, Vivienne Westwood was grudgingly acknowledged to be a designer with good ideas, and it was rumoured that even Armani was influenced by her, sometimes, bizarre collections which he then refined down to more acceptable designs.
The Japanese onslaught was unexpected, to say the least. The Kimono had looked the same for centuries, and that garment had been elevated to the realm of fine art with its textile design telling the story of Japanese history and reflecting little details and hidden messages that only the Japanese could decipher. Which made it all the more surprising when Miyake burst upon the international fashion scene with his futuristic and often shockingly proportioned creations that turned the entire world of fashion on its head. Even his perfume L’Eau D’Issey went on to become a modern classic.
Together with designers like Rei Kawakubo, Yohji Yamamoto and Kenzo, Miyake was redefining the boundaries of fashion and creating clothes that were a melange of pop-art, magical illusion and colours so vivid that it seemed he had created a fantasy of fashion that was thoroughly modern and sometimes difficult to understand.
Miyake invented fabrics that had never been seen, let alone worn before. In 2018, I was invited to Tokyo by the Issey Miyake Foundation to show a documentary film that I had made on the great textile expert Martand Singh. Martand was affectionately known as Mapu, and he was responsible for introducing Miyake to the wonderful world of Indian textiles and khadi, which the great designer then adapted in his collections. This was done in collaboration with textile designer Asha Sarabhai to create a collection called HaaT, which retails in Japan and is extremely popular. We showed the film in Tokyo at Miyake’s exhibition of khadi called ‘Homage to Martand Singh’, whom he deeply admired. Miyake travelled extensively in India with Martand and Rakesh Thakore, researching various Indian handlooms and varieties of khadi which he later incorporated into his collections. His love and admiration for Indian textiles is something that should inspire us and teach us to value our own heritage.
Miyake was a visionary, a man who saw the future of fashion and incorporated it into our lives to gift and share with us his extraordinary talent and unerring eye for style.
(The writer is a fashion and textile curator with over four decades of experience in the fashion & event industry)