Japanese Fashion

Japanese fashion has it all. From salary men in thin dark suits to Tokyo girls wearing ultra exclusive, tiny designer handbags carrying dogs the same size as a small handbag. I love the strange and unusual in Japanese fashion. Teenage girls in lycra lemon tights or skinny girls in gothic black dresses or bright over sized watches and painted nails. For some very odd reason Japanese kids come to London and like old, vintage and charity shop clothes.  Are they bored of too much Dior and Gucci? Don't get rid of your old clothes just give them to Oxfam and soon or later you will see them appear in Japan.

Oscar Wilde once said something like you don't need to go to Japan because everything Japanese can be found on Oxford Street. Now it is surely the reverse: everything English can be found on the streets of Tokyo. It is a well known fact that Paul Smith the men's clothing designer is a big big celebrity in Japan.

The people who created and still create traditional arts and crafts in Japan are known as shokunin. Here is a short video you might enjoy showing textile dyeing and a wonderful loom in operation. The Indian soundtrack though is quite annoying and distracting. Here is the youtube link

A final word must go of course to Oscar Wilde who said of Japan (though I'm not sure I agree):

''In fact, the whole of Japan is a pure invention. There is no such country, there are no such people.... The Japanese people are ... simply a mode of style, an exquisite fancy of art.''

Oops.. sorry forgot to add this. A beautiful Channel 4 ident (a kind of gap in the T.V. programs) of Tokyo at street level. It is really beautiful like your walking through the streets and the kids voices. Like the classic SF movie Blade Runner but without the androids.