You'd be excused for getting lost while shopping at any of the eight main Comme des Garçons stores around the world, not to mention the guerrilla pop-ups. It requires no small mnemonic feat to remember their hidden locations and a love of adventure to navigate their challenging layouts. Take, for example, the multi-floored Dover Street Market in London, with its maze of hallways and candy store-like selection, or the new Jan Comme des Garçons men's store in Tokyo (pictured here), named after its Belgian designer, Jan de c*ck, whose copious use of chipwood intentionally blocks each step. It's all worth it, of course. As anyone who's ever set out in search of conceptual fashion knows, the retail reward is in the journey, with the purchase a close second. Here, CDG designer and mistress of illusion Rei Kawakubo talks shop with Hint.
[FONT=Arial,sans-serif][SIZE=-1]Do you enjoy shopping? Of course. I like many, many kinds of stores, stalls, markets, anything strong and exciting and with something to say. [/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Arial,sans-serif][SIZE=-1][/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Arial,sans-serif][SIZE=-1]Which of your stores was the most difficult to realize? Dover Street Market because we did it with lots of other people. It is also my favorite, since it is the most ground-breaking[/SIZE][/FONT]
[FONT=Arial,sans-serif][SIZE=-1]
[/SIZE][/FONT]
Do people go into the stores only to look at the design? I think so, yes.
Do you go to the architects with ideas for the stores? We don't work with architects anymore. I do it with my team of constructors
What is the first thought you want people to have when they enter your stores? Wow, I've never seen anything like this before.
How important is the neighborhood to the success of the stores? I think rather important. That is why we choose interesting but unfashionable areas.
The New York store helped make Chelsea an important art center, and many artists and gallerists there wear Comme des Garçons. Was that intentional? No, not at all, but it was inevitable. It happened in SoHo. People tend to follow us. It can't be helped!
Which is closer to your heart, art or fashion? The breaking down of the barriers between these two things.
Do you consider yourself an international designer or a Japanese designer? Just a designer. Place of birth is an accident.
Many designers design for the moment, but you seem to design a few steps ahead, or to the side. Does that come naturally? Anything really new always tends to be ahead of its time. Comme des Garçons stands for trying to do new things
Your method is to work against the grain of fashion. Are you anti-elitist? We just try to do new things. That is the basic value of Comme des Garçons since the beginning, and until the end! It is not about elitism, or anti-elitism. We don't abide by the rules
hintmag.com
