Thank you so much for coming to our pop-up event in Shibuya the other day.

This event, held as a collaboration with photographer Mirei Kuno's photo exhibition, gave us as organizers plenty of new insights as well.

 

Being able to bring together so many of tomo kishida's pieces, both new and archival, also made it a great opportunity for people to learn about his work and activities.

The collaborative pieces made for the event, combining Kuno's photography with tomo kishida's sakiori weaving, were also our first attempt at something like this. We worked through a lot of trial and error, and the results turned out wonderfully, opening up plenty of possibilities for the future.

One piece (right in the photo) prints a photograph onto a backdrop cloth that Kuno had used in shoots until it got too soiled to use, then reworks it through sakiori.

Another (center) prints a photograph afterward onto the sakiori sheeting fabric that tomo kishida weaves as one of his staples.

And a third (left), woven in sakiori from paper that had been printed with a photograph — we made and displayed all three types.

 

Since they turned out so wonderfully, we've been talking about bringing them along when Lounge Sai holds events in other cities, so we can show them somewhere else too.

So if you didn't get to see them this time, we hope you'll look forward to that chance.

By the way, this time I bought the photo piece of Mont-Saint-Michel printed onto this fabric work.

It's a beautiful, strange piece that was also used in the collaboration with tomo kishida, and there was no way I wasn't going to buy it.

I've never been to Mont-Saint-Michel and have no particular attachment to it, and buying a piece of art was probably a first for me in my life, but coming across a work I could want without a shred of hesitation was something to be happy about.

 

And now, about tomo kishida.

This time, new pieces appeared that reinterpret the Japanese kimono through tomo kishida's own lens.

The new un-kimono coat.

When it arrived and I tried it on, it was so good — maybe even the best piece I've had, if anything — that I let out a gasp of admiration I hadn't in a long while.

There are plenty of clothes out there that reinterpret Japanese dress and kimono, but this piece, which carries forward everything behind his making while bringing in the essence of the kimono, struck me as a true masterpiece — one that distills tomo kishida's philosophy itself.

 

This pattern is a different one from the un-kimono coat above, but since traditional Japanese garment patterns, unlike Western clothing, are basically built from straight lines alone, this new piece too is made up entirely of rectangular pattern pieces.

Making clothes with this kind of straight-line pattern also means no fabric is left over as scraps in the process, and in that respect too, you can see that traditional Japanese garments have real affinity with tomo kishida's own approach to making things.

 

As for sizing, tomo kishida's clothes are all one-of-a-kind pieces to begin with, so rather than a standard S/M/L size range, the style has always been for you to pick whichever size suits you — but this season's kimono-pattern clothes are quite literally "one size fits all."

 

Clothes that aren't sized to any particular body, and yet look right on any body type, with no awkwardness in how the shoulders fall — as if the fabric adapts itself to you.

 

This coat isn't sakiori; the black warp is cotton, and the ecru weft uses linen thread.

This loose weave, possible only because it's hand-woven, gives it a soft, light feel that's surprisingly comfortable to wear.

The buttons are silver.

 

And now, done in sakiori using fabric normally used for suits, a seriously powerful un-kimono coat.

This is the long, winter-ready version.

A serious midwinter coat before summer even starts — but if he comes up with fabric he likes, he makes it regardless of season.

Isn't that kind of making things, driven purely by the will and feeling to make it, a good thing too?

 

Sakiori weaves new fabric using thin strips of torn cloth as thread; normally this makes for a stiff, rug-like fabric, but tomo kishida's sakiori tailors its clothes from a distinctive fabric that alternates torn cloth and ordinary thread — “torn cloth → thread → torn cloth → thread → torn cloth.”

That's how he creates sakiori pieces that feel modern and are easy to wear in everyday life — pieces brought into the realm of fashion rather than staying mere craft objects.

 

But this time, the fabric is woven the opposite way, without threading ordinary yarn in between, keeping the original sakiori feel while giving the coat a fabric that's sturdy and warm enough to be genuinely practical.

Ever since starting the brand, he's kept challenging himself to digest traditional craft and turn it into something original, and I think it's precisely because he's now got a real sense of having established his own sakiori style that, even when he goes back to a more original sakiori technique, he can still bring it into a modern piece that reflects his own colors.

 

Something both coats share, too, is that the weave pattern isn't a simple plain weave — it carries a Japanese feel that suits the mood of the piece, which is another nice touch.

Also, out of respect for the custom of taking kimono apart at the seams and re-tailoring them when they're passed from parent to child, this series is entirely hand-sewn, with no sewing machine used at all.

 

The persuasive beauty built up through his years of accumulated making, amid a flood of clothes that let sloppy construction pass as mere "mood," and by carrying handmade construction through to the very end, its strength — not just as a piece of work, but as "a product that is clothing" — has clearly gone up.

These were new pieces that made it clear tomo kishida has taken a step forward as a brand — or maybe even further than that.

 

 

By the way, this black long coat has sold out; the coat in the thinner fabric is still available.

So I decided to bring it home for myself.

Can you tell how the shoulders drop, how the fabric flows so light and easy?

The look is styled with an EŸN VAS T-shirt, DseconD pants, and A Diciannoveventitre boots.

It could work all-black or with some color mixed in, but rather than buttoning it up sharp over a button-down shirt, I think something rougher and more casual underneath, like a T-shirt or tank top, looks cooler.

 

Even though it's kimono-inspired, it doesn't lean too far into that, so the balance that lets you wear it easily in everyday life is just right.

I already own a sakiori cardigan and long coat by tomo kishida, but neither one can be worn in the hot months, so at temperatures like now, around the start and end of summer, this one should come in handy.

 

tomo kishida's clothing isn't available online, but we plan to keep introducing it at events going forward, including this kimono series and past pieces as well, so we hope you'll come and enjoy each one-time encounter with the work as it happens.

 

 

As for perfume, following Osaka, we introduced ATELIER MATERI at our shop in Tokyo for the first time too, and I think it gave people a chance to see how each brand has its own character, and to discover just how fascinating and deep the world of scent can be.

 

 

This time, “new” kept piling up on “new.”

These Osaka and Tokyo events really drove home something obvious — that trying something new gives you a fresh sense of things you didn't have before.

 

We're also working on bringing in new brands soon, both in clothing and perfume, so please keep an eye out and look forward to that news.