TakahiroMiyashita on His Latest Collection

It is rare that Takahiro Miyashita explains his collections, though we find his mental process absolutely fascinating. And so we were thrilled that the photos and video of this collection came with a little Q&A with editor Junsuke Yamasaki.

Tell us your thoughts on COVID-19 as well as the relation between your new collection and the current state of the world.

Our lives have changed completely, like this is something I’ve never experienced before. Even though I was quick to accept the situation, it prompted so many questions for me. I couldn’t stop doing what I’ve always been doing because this is actually the very exact moment we need to achieve further evolution. I needed to create something more bold, as usual in a way. Not only for myself but for fashion, I felt like fashion would be constrained to tread water. The world of fashion needs to have more messages. My job is to create clothes so I apply a lot of messages on my clothes, some hidden and some obvious, especially when this short film becomes the fashion show. This is a chance to express how everyone is equal, whether you’re man or woman, big or small, no matter what your skin color is. We need to be even more creative in order to stand up to the others and I don’t really know how to put brakes on myself either.

What are the inspiration and concept of your new collection?

I thought the “Spatialism” of Lucio Fontana would be perfect. When I saw one of his exhibitions, I felt that it was beyond all boundaries. And that’s what I wanted to do. It doesn’t matter where I am, I don’t even need to tell how I am a fashion designer. I also have always believed in Milton Glaser’s famous quote, “Design is the process of going from an existing condition to a preferred one..,” in order to accept the reality. And yet, in exchange for his death, I’ve revamped my ideas. And my graphics style so happened to become quite hand-created and ragged, which is different from his style. These are a couple of inspirations for the collection.

How did you find your approach using staplers and heat bonding, or simply without sewing?

I’ve always been fond of industrial parts so I used staples and nail head rivets this time. I initially thought to use actual nails, like the underside of a sofa has nails all over which looks so fearless and unique to me. It’s made with a rational approach, “don’t matter ‘cus it gets covered,” which is similar to creating architecture. I wanted to incorporate that as a style of making clothes. Say, the idea for using rubber tape and heat bonding came from questioning “why do we need to sew to make clothes?” I had the creative method of furniture and architecture and such in mind.

The piece you had the idea from a garment case was also impressive to me.

I often check hangers and hanger-covers of hotels and dry cleaners in oversea countries. So I happened to be looking at them one day and thought it might be a good idea. First, I was looking at the hanger-cover which its shape almost fits a human shoulder and yet it only fits hangers which made me think of the possibility of creating something in one-size. It made me want to challenge this idea of one-size no matter what. Today, people come in so much variety which didn’t exist in the past and I started to think, “what is size?” This challenge will continue on for me.

I heard this collection includes a line for women.

That’s because there was a woman appearing in the scene. But as I have mentioned since the beginning, I’m not interested in sex or gender difference. There’s no particular intention in doing a women’s line and I imagined quite a man-like woman in any case.

Tell us about the short film and music that is being released.

I knew that a short film was the only way for this release so I started imagining what it would be like. I asked my old friend to do the music but I also started to have a feeling for taking a part in the music creation myself and actually tried some guitar and humming. My final thought is that a clothes-maker could actually dabble in creating a film without having to call on a grand production team, and finish a piece.