Comme des Garcons Shirt Section:
Rei Kawakubo, the designer behind fashion label Comme des Garçons, was born in Tokyo, Japan. In 1964 She graduated from college after studying fine arts and literature at Keio University in Tokyo. Shortly after her studies, Rei Kawakubo worked under Japanese textile designer Asahi Kasei and in 1966 Rei Kawakubo became a free lance fashion designer.
Three years later, Rei Kawakubo established her own company in Tokyo, which she called "Comme des Garcons" which in French means "Like the boys". Although she did not intend to make only boys clothing, she liked the sound of this French name. In 1978 she added a men's clothing line to her label, which she called "Homme". The men's line proved very popular.
In 1980 Rei Kawakubo moved to Paris where she set up a salon in order to present her first collection which she did in 1981. She also opened a Comme des Garçons boutique shortly afterwards.
Kawakubo achieved her greatest attention in Paris during the late 70's and early 80's with her non-traditional clothing, which attempted to redefine accepted ideas. Her torn, crumpled garments, draped around the body with seemingly no acknowledgement of body shape, were initially viewed as ugly and ridiculous. Nevertheless Her sombre shades and flat sexless image, had a considerable impact on dress styles of the 80's.
Comme des Garcons specialized in anti-fashion, austere, sometimes deconstructed garments, sometimes lacking a sleeve or other component. Her garments were primarily black. However she said "there are many blacks, not only one, each black has a shade within it." She meant that black can often have a blue tint, a purple shade or even some grey in it.
The collection was dubbed by the fashion writers as "Hiroshima chic" and it managed to achieve two things. It put black in the forefront, which was until then, an unpopular colour, and it revised notions of the body by obscuring the silhouette with shapeless irregularly perforated boiled wools.
Kitmeout - Today's Fashion Online
