📸 PICTORIAL: Japanese fashion designer Issey Miyake dies at 84

AFP .
@New Vision
Aug 10, 2022

Japanese fashion designer Issey Miyake, whose global career spanned more than half a century, has died aged 84, an employee at his office in Tokyo told AFP on Tuesday.

“He died on the evening of August 5,” she said over the telephone, without giving further details of his death and declining to be named.

Miyake’s funeral had already taken place, with “only relatives participating” in line with his wishes, and there were no plans for a public ceremony, she said.

Public broadcaster NHK and other Japanese media reported the news of his death, with the Asahi Shimbun newspaper and other outlets saying he had died of liver cancer.

Miyake – who pioneered high-tech, comfortable clothing – was part of a wave of young Japanese designers who made their mark in Paris from the mid-1970s.

The French fashion federation paid tribute to Miyake on Tuesday, saying “he was the first foreign designer to show at Paris Fashion Week in April 1974”.

Miyake “contributed, with unwavering commitment, to the influence of Paris Fashion Week from its beginning,” said Bruno Pavlovsky, president of the Federation de la Haute Couture et de la Mode.

Miyake’s fashion house nurtured many talented young designers, and was known for innovative and dazzling catwalk shows.

After two years of showcasing collections online or with installations during the COVID-19 pandemic, the brand made its live comeback at Paris Fashion Week in June with a men’s show featuring models, dancers and acrobats.

In this file photo taken on June 23, 2022, models present creations during the Issey Miyake Menswear Spring/Summer 2023 show, as part of Paris Fashion Week, in Paris

In this file photo taken on March 1, 2020, models present creations by Issey Miyake during the Women’s Fall-Winter 2020-2021 Ready-to-Wear collection fashion show in Paris

In this file photo taken on September 27, 2019, a model rides on a skateboard as she presents a creation by Japanese designer Issey Miyake during the Women’s Spring-Summer 2020 Ready-to-Wear collection fashion show, in Paris

Born in Hiroshima in 1938, he was seven years old when the United States dropped an atomic bomb on the city in August 1945.

He survived the blast, which killed an estimated 140,000 people on impact and led to the end of World War II after the bombing of Nagasaki three days later.

“I have never chosen to share my memories or thoughts of that day,” Miyake wrote in the New York Times in 2009.

“I have tried, albeit unsuccessfully, to put them behind me, preferring to think of things that can be created, not destroyed, and that bring beauty and joy.”

The designer studied at an art school in Tokyo, and moved to Paris in 1965, where he studied at the elite Ecole de la Chambre Syndicale de la Couture Parisienne.

(FILES) In this file photo taken on September 28, 2018, models present creations by Issey Miyake during the Spring-Summer 2019 Ready-to-Wear collection fashion show in Paris

He established the Miyake Design Studio in Tokyo in 1970, and soon afterwards opened his first Paris boutique.

By the 1980s, his career was in full swing as he experimented with materials from plastic to metal wire and even artisanal Japanese paper.

In this file photo taken on December 9, 2020, a Bao Bao Issey Miyake Lucent Metallic tote bag is displayed during a press preview for the forthcoming exhibition ‘Bags: Inside Out’ at the Victoria and Albert (V&A) museum in London

Among his inventions were the “Pleats Please” line, permanently pleated items which do not crease, the futuristic triangles of his “Bao Bao” bag, and his “A-POC (A Piece Of Cloth)” concept – using computers to cut whole garments with no seams.

He also made more than 100 black turtlenecks for Apple co-founder Steve Jobs.

In this file photo taken on March 7, 1994, models display a “Pleats Please” dress as part of Issey Miyake Autumn-Winter 1995 ready-to-wear collection in Paris

(This photo taken on 26 March 2007 shows Japanese famous fashion designer Issey Miyake (R) chatting with Sweden’s Queen Silvia at the newly-opened design museum “21-21 Design Sight” at the Tokyo Midtown mall

This file photo taken on October 19, 1991 shows Japanese fashion designer Issey Miyake acknowledging the applause from models and attendees after presenting his 1992 Spring-Summer collection in Paris
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