THE JOURNAL
This summer, we’re looking beyond the mainstream style circuit to bring you the very best that the Pacific region can offer with Pacific Dream, our celebration of the menswear and lifestyle brands that matter from Tokyo, Los Angeles and beyond. We’ve already taken you through the highlights of our campaign and we’ve also focused on five of the best shoes, but we couldn’t leave the Pacific without giving you a closer look at some of the great stuff coming out of Japan.
A mecca for avant-garde fashion ever since the 1980s heyday of Messrs Issey Miyake, Yohji Yamamoto and Ms Rei Kawakubo, and before that an unofficial second home for mid-century American collegiate cool – Take Ivy by Mr Teruyoshi Hayashida, a photobook capturing the life and style of Ivy League students in the 1960s, was a huge hit in the country – Japan today is rightly regarded as one of the menswear capitals of the world. It’s the place to go if you want the best denim, the hottest streetwear, meticulously handcrafted eyewear and the most forward-thinking fashion labels. Naturally, then, we had to schedule an extended visit on our style tour of the Pacific. Here are just a few of the things we picked up on the way.
01.
Needles
Founded in 1997 by Mr Keizo Shimizu of legendary Toyko streetwear boutique Nepenthes, Needles is known for smartly blending a multitude of American and Japanese style influences, which range from Ivy League trad to retro sportswear and 1990s grunge. Its butterfly logo – seen here embroidered onto the chest of a retro-style bowling shirt, which the brand made exclusively for MR PORTER – is a bit of a secret handshake for the in-the-know streetwear cognoscenti.
02.
WTAPS
WTAPS is a Tokyo streetwear brand founded in 1996 by the ex-creative director of Neighborhood, Mr Tetsu “Tet” Nishiyama. Pronounced “double taps” after a military term for shooting two bullets at the same target in rapid succession, it makes for a rather appropriate name for the brand, which is all about creatively reinterpreting vintage military clothing. As such, you can expect hard-wearing fabrics such as ripstop cotton and herringbone twill, functional details such as bellows pockets, and plenty of military green. The cool bucket hat seen here is a case in point.
03.
KAPITAL
One of the brightest jewels in the Japanese fashion industry’s crown is its high-end selvedge denim, the majority of which is made in Kojima, a tiny district in the largely rural Okayama Prefecture known as Japan’s “denim capital”. This is where KAPITAL gets its name. A small family-run denim business founded in the 1980s, it has transformed itself into a global brand under the direction of Mr Kiro Hirata, the son of the company’s founder, and is now one of Japan’s most famous fashion exports. Its smiley-face socks are a favourite in the MR PORTER offices; this exclusive J-Wave kimono, an exclusive design for Pacific Dream, is a bit more of a statement.
04.
Neighborhood
Mr Shinsuke Takizawa is considered one of the grandfathers of the Tokyo streetwear scene along with NIGO, Messrs Jun Takahashi and Hiroshi Fujiwara. He founded the motorcycle culture-inspired Neighborhood in 1994, a time when the Harajuku streetwear scene was just opening up to international attention, but the brand has remained difficult to find outside of Japan. (Unless you happen to be shopping on MR PORTER, that is.) If you’re looking for an easy entry into the world of Neighborhood, its logo T-shirts – one of which is featured here – are a great place to start.