THE STORY 19 FALL WINTER

The key colour for this collection is blue.
Maiko Kurogouchi's journey to find different shades of blue accidentally started when she found herself fascinated by the way blue bath salt dissolved into water, though it was something she used daily.
Which reminded her of an old piece of Ai, natural indigo, textile made in Edo era she found in Nara that summer. While it must have been fading gradually over 400 years, the indigo blue was illuminant. To Maiko, that indigo represented countless fragments of memories of those who acquired and used it.
In the dream, she saw herself climbing a blue, icy mountain and falling into winter ocean. During her travel, she was taken aback by her own skin seemingly coloured blue in a hot spring, shone by the moon and stars.
Toward the end of the designing process, Maiko stumbled upon faded pale blue found on fragments of early Imari pottery she discovered from dirt at an old kiln site in Saga. She also remembered that the last movie Derek Jarman made was Blue.
That is how the palette of blue was gradually made, with one blue at a time, one textile at a time, using various techniques.
The dissolving bath salt was turned into a Jacquard woven silk, leaving some strings unwoven to mimic the blue lines in water and the worn out ancient textile. The pattern made in Kyoto was brought to Hiroshima where it was woven. The silk dress fabric with Komon pattern was woven using a barely existing loom in Ishikawa and embroidered in Gunma. While every step of the production ran into a few hurdles, Kurogouchi and skilled artisans spent countless hours going back and forth in order to achieve what she envisioned.
This process was a journey on its own which led to the completion of palette of blues.