COVER STORY: The Way of Cool

Caption: Designers Mikio Sakabe (left) and Shueh Jen-Fang amongst their Autumn-Winter 2010 line that Sakabe says is “inspired by a girl who seems to be listening to nineties hard rock and heavy metal wherever she goes.” The powerful styling arising from the use of graphics that are suggestive of band T-shirts, extremely long-length tops, and so forth are striking. And daringly bleached denim too creates a gothic look.
Credit: YUICHI ITABASHI

Streets Ahead

Many Japanese designers start to turn their attention overseas when they enter the world of fashion. In that sense, Mikio Sakabe’s stance is a breath of fresh air. Designer Sakabe was top of the graduating class in the Fashion Department of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts, Antwerp. Refusing many offers, he began the Mikio Sakabe brand in Tokyo as a partner of Shueh Jen-Fang, a native of Taiwan.

“The strongest area of Japanese fashion is street fashion. In street fashion, cheap items are teamed with luxury brands without hesitation to produce combinations that would be unthinkable to Europeans. Previously, these styles had been ridiculed in Europe, but now the attitude in Japan of not being concerned with the combination as long as it is stylish is considered cool by the rest of the world. After I graduated, I didn’t feel that I would be doing anything new by going straight on to make my debut in Europe, working in Paris. What I wanted to do was transmit to the world the fashion of Japan, which is in Asia.”

In September 2007, Sakabe made his debut in the Tokyo Collection, and since 2008 has been invited to show at the Milan Collection every year, to high acclaim.

On the final day of Japan Fashion Week in October 2009, he took part in a joint exhibition of three young design teams, entitled “This is Fashion.” The other participants were the Japanese brands Akira Naka (by Akira Naka) and writtenafterwards (by Yoshikazu Yamagata). Both designers, like Sakabe, studied fashion in Europe. As well as the show collection, installations and live paintings by contemporary artists were staged simultaneously.

“Projects such as this one are still small-scale. What I would like to do is introduce a wide variety of genres so that people who are not interested in fashion will also be drawn in. I want to generate an interesting movement from Tokyo.”