Showing posts with label Arts and Design. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Arts and Design. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 14, 2012
Jun Takahashi: My Thoughts on Collaboration with Uniqlo
Since the announcement of this project, I have heard a lot of opinions, both pro and con. Some say they can’t make heads or tails out of {can’t make heads or tails out of: something is too difficult or complicated for someone to understand} UNIQLO’s intention in partnering with UNDERCOVER, and others say they are expecting to see something truly innovative come out of this collaboration of polar opposites. It is only natural to think that opinions would be divided.
More than a year ago, when I first heard this talk, I questioned this project; to be honest, my first thought was “Why us?” It may be my personality, but at the same time, I felt a combination of apprehension and curiosity. At first, just to satisfy my curiosity, I wanted to hear from the people in charge who were really passionate.
Talks began with the reason for the request from UNIQLO, “We want the creations for the Japanese to reach people around the world.” To which I replied, “What should I do?” “What can we accomplish?” “Do we have anything in common, and if so what?” As I asked these questions I found myself gradually becoming interested in this project. We had several more discussions, as a result of which, an idea popped up almost simultaneously from both sides: “clothes for mom, dad and the children; clothes for the family.” We had found our common ground.
As far as children’s clothing is concerned, as UNDERCOVER announced some 10 years ago, because we were unable to balance production volume and cost, we had to sadly give up. My wife, RICO, did the designing. RICO is really fabulous at creating children’s clothes. One of the main reasons why I decided to do this project and resume making children’s clothes was the fact that the line had so many fans. Another big reason was that I wanted to offer our creations to people who until now had never heard of UNDERCOVER. In this regard, we have a bigger footprint than other brands. It would be a wonderful thing to have many people wearing the clothes I had designed. Price-wise and design-wise UNDERCOVER clothing was not for everyone, but now it could be.
That said, if I made such clothes with strong design elements that I have always done, this collaboration would never have come about. The basic idea of Uniqlo is “low priced products everyone can wear.” The role of UNDERCOVER is to add a little spice to that basic principle. You might say that adding a “spoonful of spice” is what this project is all about.
Some people might say that this project is not what UNDERCOVER is about; then again others might say it’s “just right.” Everyone has their opinion, so there are of course going to be pros and cons. The results of my spoonful of spice on our collaboration can be seen on the “uu” site and in our catalog. Designs recognizable by everyone. I thought at that time, what design can I infuse in basic clothing? It’s not going to work if you add too much or remove too much. Where do you stop? The first season was in a manner of speaking a series of trials and errors. The selection of fabrics and colors, cost vs. design, how to stay balanced and edgy. It meant using a totally different headset than before to design clothes for uu that are completely different from UNDERCOVER. It was a really difficult task.
Now all the designs for the second season have been finished. For me, in the second season I was able to finally get a feel for the shape of this collaboration. Last week, we already held the second season individual color sample approval meeting. (The approval meeting is where all the key members of the project, starting with President Yanai, meet to hear an explanation of the new products.) After running through the product descriptions, President Yanai said, “Truly amazing, I’m really impressed!” Looking at the second season, it seemed to me that President Yanai could see the part UNDERCOVER had played in the collaboration. At that moment I felt the question “What should I do for Uniqlo?” was clearly answered. It would appear my idea to “add a spoonful of spice” had been accepted. (I don’t know if 100%, but I just might ask President Yanai the next time I see him).
Whether or not this collaboration will continue in the future has not been decided yet, but in any case a new page in my life has been written. As always, I try my best and never cut corners.
A new endevor for a new era.
A project only UNDERCOVER can undertake.
“We offer families something positive in these tough times.” That is the thinking behind uu designs. I sincerely hope your family enjoys our clothes.
Jun Takahashi
More than a year ago, when I first heard this talk, I questioned this project; to be honest, my first thought was “Why us?” It may be my personality, but at the same time, I felt a combination of apprehension and curiosity. At first, just to satisfy my curiosity, I wanted to hear from the people in charge who were really passionate.
Talks began with the reason for the request from UNIQLO, “We want the creations for the Japanese to reach people around the world.” To which I replied, “What should I do?” “What can we accomplish?” “Do we have anything in common, and if so what?” As I asked these questions I found myself gradually becoming interested in this project. We had several more discussions, as a result of which, an idea popped up almost simultaneously from both sides: “clothes for mom, dad and the children; clothes for the family.” We had found our common ground.
As far as children’s clothing is concerned, as UNDERCOVER announced some 10 years ago, because we were unable to balance production volume and cost, we had to sadly give up. My wife, RICO, did the designing. RICO is really fabulous at creating children’s clothes. One of the main reasons why I decided to do this project and resume making children’s clothes was the fact that the line had so many fans. Another big reason was that I wanted to offer our creations to people who until now had never heard of UNDERCOVER. In this regard, we have a bigger footprint than other brands. It would be a wonderful thing to have many people wearing the clothes I had designed. Price-wise and design-wise UNDERCOVER clothing was not for everyone, but now it could be.
That said, if I made such clothes with strong design elements that I have always done, this collaboration would never have come about. The basic idea of Uniqlo is “low priced products everyone can wear.” The role of UNDERCOVER is to add a little spice to that basic principle. You might say that adding a “spoonful of spice” is what this project is all about.
Some people might say that this project is not what UNDERCOVER is about; then again others might say it’s “just right.” Everyone has their opinion, so there are of course going to be pros and cons. The results of my spoonful of spice on our collaboration can be seen on the “uu” site and in our catalog. Designs recognizable by everyone. I thought at that time, what design can I infuse in basic clothing? It’s not going to work if you add too much or remove too much. Where do you stop? The first season was in a manner of speaking a series of trials and errors. The selection of fabrics and colors, cost vs. design, how to stay balanced and edgy. It meant using a totally different headset than before to design clothes for uu that are completely different from UNDERCOVER. It was a really difficult task.
Now all the designs for the second season have been finished. For me, in the second season I was able to finally get a feel for the shape of this collaboration. Last week, we already held the second season individual color sample approval meeting. (The approval meeting is where all the key members of the project, starting with President Yanai, meet to hear an explanation of the new products.) After running through the product descriptions, President Yanai said, “Truly amazing, I’m really impressed!” Looking at the second season, it seemed to me that President Yanai could see the part UNDERCOVER had played in the collaboration. At that moment I felt the question “What should I do for Uniqlo?” was clearly answered. It would appear my idea to “add a spoonful of spice” had been accepted. (I don’t know if 100%, but I just might ask President Yanai the next time I see him).
Whether or not this collaboration will continue in the future has not been decided yet, but in any case a new page in my life has been written. As always, I try my best and never cut corners.
A new endevor for a new era.
A project only UNDERCOVER can undertake.
“We offer families something positive in these tough times.” That is the thinking behind uu designs. I sincerely hope your family enjoys our clothes.
Jun Takahashi
The First Starbucks Produced by Hiroshi Fujiwara Opens in Omotesando
Located between Shibuya and Harajuku, Omotesando is the most fashionable street in bustling Tokyo. It's physical configuration is something like Orchard St. in Singapore, but this place is not just about collection of world famous commercial symbols, but has a bunch of people who lead it's culture not from the cozy office in skyscrapers but from street sides where underground culture is born.
Hiroshi Fujiwara is one of the key persons of Street culture in Tokyo. Unlike Nigo or Jun Takahashi, he is not a designer nor an artist. But everything he touch transforms into stylish, something we've accustomed to as cool stuffs from Tokyo.
Starbucks, well known for it's hungry BUSINESS spirit, understandably tries to exploit this core Tokyo street culture scene. Collaborating with Hiroshi, they renovate their existing Omotesando B-side shop and will open the new conceptual store on 31th Mar.
Cozy color tone, relaxing music, special menus exclusive to this store, this space is expected to be a favorite chilling space for shoppers and staffs working for neighbourhood shops.
The theme of this renovation is "nature and relax". This is a first time Starbucks invite producers from outside the corporation, and first time for Fujiwara to produce cafe a design, too. "I feel I'm impressed by Starbuck's corporate spirit of ambitiousness to try something totally new such as 'Break the rules'. This place is one block inside the busy Omotesando street so it's relaxing although the fact that it'a very urban place." Hiroshi said. He's also involved in the selection of BGM and menu. His favorite menu is Shaken Orange Jasmine tea (\420 - approx $5) made from a blend of herb tea and fresh fruit juice.
Starbucks and Hiroshi will continue their collaboration and will be extended to Mug design or live music event etc.
(source from Fashionsnap)
Read more...
Hiroshi Fujiwara is one of the key persons of Street culture in Tokyo. Unlike Nigo or Jun Takahashi, he is not a designer nor an artist. But everything he touch transforms into stylish, something we've accustomed to as cool stuffs from Tokyo.Starbucks, well known for it's hungry BUSINESS spirit, understandably tries to exploit this core Tokyo street culture scene. Collaborating with Hiroshi, they renovate their existing Omotesando B-side shop and will open the new conceptual store on 31th Mar.
Cozy color tone, relaxing music, special menus exclusive to this store, this space is expected to be a favorite chilling space for shoppers and staffs working for neighbourhood shops.
The theme of this renovation is "nature and relax". This is a first time Starbucks invite producers from outside the corporation, and first time for Fujiwara to produce cafe a design, too. "I feel I'm impressed by Starbuck's corporate spirit of ambitiousness to try something totally new such as 'Break the rules'. This place is one block inside the busy Omotesando street so it's relaxing although the fact that it'a very urban place." Hiroshi said. He's also involved in the selection of BGM and menu. His favorite menu is Shaken Orange Jasmine tea (\420 - approx $5) made from a blend of herb tea and fresh fruit juice.
Starbucks and Hiroshi will continue their collaboration and will be extended to Mug design or live music event etc.
Starbucks Mug Cup with the logo of Omotesando B-store exclusive to this store will go on sale from 27th June.
(source from Fashionsnap)
Kengo Kuma Meets Starbucks
(via Architizer)
Kuma Kengo (Kengo Kuma in Anglo name order) is a Japanese famous architect, who designed this unique Starbucks shop in Dazaifu, Fukuoka. His obsessiveness of Paticlization has long been obvious from his works such as Hiroshige Museum, Asahi Broadcasting HQ, or River/Filter. Personally his best work is Hiroshige museum by far, but in each work he aimed at different goals so it's difficult to tell from object itself without context.I always think what separate designers and Architects... it's difficult to put into words but Kuma's work tells that difference the best for me. Architects like him, They always care the context of the city. This shop is faced to the approach to the iconic shrine Dazaifu-Tenmangu, so he tried to add traditional structure here, but at the same time, try to diffuse it into the typical cheap Japanese cityscape. The frame of this shop is identical to the archetype of Japanese low-budget city housings, among which this tiny architecture fits in.
Two back gardens and a cherry tree are put in this narrow deep land plot expecting to be a community space for the local people and who come to visit the shrine.
So far this is the best-designed Starbucks in Japan.
Slideshow - click to start
Friday, March 09, 2012
A Photographer - Mount Fuji 1
 |
| Spring Lakeside |
Since this is a broad topic, I write several posts on different topics of Mountain faith and culture of Fuji. Make sure to check out articles come later ;)
In this post I introduce you to the photographer who had been obsessed with Fuji for his whole life. His name is Okada Kohyo.
Okada Kohyo
 |
| This photo "Yamanami - Mountain Wave" was exhibited at British Museum in 2006, as an image of Japan |
 |
| Kohyo - Koh yoh - Red Sunlight |
Kohyo, who started photographing Fuji while he was a university student had been a contracted photographer for Tokyo metropolitan government. At the request from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, he held a number of exhibitions abroad, letting world know the word Fujiyama.
It is said that Kohyo took 380thousands (gasp!) of original photos of Mount Fuji. But among these none could reach the goal set by himself. He boasted, 'None of my pictures are what I can call Masterpiece', and called Mount Fuji 'My Girl'.
 |
| Mount Fuji is printed on current 1000 yen notes and previous 5000 yen notes. |
Sunday, March 04, 2012
Murakami Book Covers
Book cover design illustrating the dream-like feeling of three of Haruki Murakami's works.
Just beautiful. Made of leather or fake leather paper? I like the thin, subtle layer of pattern on the back of inside covers.
(via christianquiambao)
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Photography goes Magical, No need to wait until crowds gone away - Scalado
Smartphone, where magic happens.
Don't say I'm being totally facetious before knowing this photo retouching app.
There are already nice photo retouching apps for iOS such as this or this, which let you easily remove objects from your photos or naturally put extra objects into your photos.
But what you see is this was merely a beginning of the magical world of smartphone's photo editing after Scalado released this app.
With this app called "Scalnado Remove" you you don't need to move your finger all over to cover the area you want to erase. Because Remove captures several images in a row, analyses them and automatically creates a composite photo devoid of unwanted details. Better yet, it highlights potential objects and lets you eliminate them manually.
The actual process of editing is introduced in this video.
The Press Release from Scalado.
Maybe the reason is because of interval length of continuous shooting of iPhone?
Anyway the engadget's hands-on review was done on Sansong' crappy galaxy phones but why don't you try it on Xperia S, that would be the best smartphone photography experience.
Read more...
Don't say I'm being totally facetious before knowing this photo retouching app.
There are already nice photo retouching apps for iOS such as this or this, which let you easily remove objects from your photos or naturally put extra objects into your photos.
But what you see is this was merely a beginning of the magical world of smartphone's photo editing after Scalado released this app.
With this app called "Scalnado Remove" you you don't need to move your finger all over to cover the area you want to erase. Because Remove captures several images in a row, analyses them and automatically creates a composite photo devoid of unwanted details. Better yet, it highlights potential objects and lets you eliminate them manually.
The actual process of editing is introduced in this video.
The Press Release from Scalado.
Scalado, a world-leading provider of high-performance imaging technologies, applications and services for the mobile industry, have today announced the release of a new revolutionizing product named Remove. Remove is a technology that automatically highlights and removes any unwanted object from a captured photo. It is the world’s first Object removal software to be released on a mobile device.If you read above sentences carefully, you'll understand why I used the word smartphone instead of iPhone or iOS. It says this app'll be released on a MOBILE DEVICES, and of all the review I saw so far, there are no images of this app running on iOS devices but on Androids.
Remove solves common photographic problems with unwanted objects in captured images, such as people getting in the way of our camera shot. Remove detects and selects the unwanted objects which simply can be removed automatically or by touching the selections on the screen or after capturing the image.
"After Zero Shutter Lag, Burst, and Rewind Scalado continue leading and changing the capturing landscape by bringing in new unique and needed capturing innovations”, says Fadi Abbas, CMO/VP BizDev and Co-founder of Scalado, -"What differentiate us is the combination of customers who believe in our superiority, leading industry partners and continuous innovations”
Last year Scalado released several innovations, e.g. the Rewind technology which allows the users to capture perfect group shots by automatically selecting the best shots in a burst and merging them into one perfect image. Rewind is already shipping in millions of mobile phones.
"Our team has been working hard to maintain its leading innovation position in the camera capturing field”, says Sami Niemi, CTO and Co-founder of Scalado, -"Remove shows that our technologies are setting the guidelines for the whole market”.
Scalado will premiere showcase Remove, the first of many new innovations planned this year, at the 2012 Mobile World Conference in Barcelona, February 27th to March 1st.
Maybe the reason is because of interval length of continuous shooting of iPhone?
Anyway the engadget's hands-on review was done on Sansong' crappy galaxy phones but why don't you try it on Xperia S, that would be the best smartphone photography experience.
But I just hope they don't tease iPhone users and will release the iOS version.
Sunday, February 26, 2012
Decorative Minimal - Xperia S
Although I enjoy my life with iPhone 4S (and it's unimaginable to live without it..), Sony's new Xperia design has drawn my attention.
Sony used to be a leader of cool gadget design. Their design had a futuristic geeky flavor but at the same time minimal, and well-organized. On top of that they had a leading technology.
But Sony in recent years seems to be loosing it's orientation, and their design once sophisticated has become boring and once geeky has become pointless.
The design of this phone is kind of reminiscent of old Sony design. Especially that transparent line reminds me the joy of decorative minimal design.
The body of Xperia S has a nice matte finish coating, which make fingerprints less noticeable.
Back side of the phone is gently rounded.
Hardware side buttons are made of metal which is a kind like iPhone, but have slimmer shape.
You can create and edit your own equalizer setting on your phone, clear base sound, clear stereo, virtual surrounded technology, sound emphasizer xLOUD... these are what Sony says I don't know what they exactly mean, but IT JUST SOUNDS NICER THAN iPHONE and iPOD.
In the lockscreen you can switch Clock to a music player by a single swipe.
12M pixels camera (and 30 fps HD 1080p video) is the highest resolution of all smartphones, but there are a lot more practical features in this camera.
 |
| Continuous auto-focus, face-recognition and shake correction unleash the capacity of full HD |
All 5 lens are AR-coated on both sides to prevent the reflection of light. The lens filter also reduce the reflection as well as color unevenness.
1.3M pixels photos and HD 720p videos can be captured by front camera.
"A single key press takes you from sleep to snap in just over a second." It take about 1.5 seconds according to Sony Japan website and shoot interval is about 0.5 second.
Display is significantly improved from Xperia arc, the previous series released a year before Xperia S.
Screen size is increased from 4.2 to 4.3, resolution is from wide VGA (854 x 480) to HD 720p (1280 x 720).
Sony just announced new models at mobile world congress which look almost identical to one another. It looks like all Sony's next generation models will have single letter names and Floating Prisms.
Xperia P has an all aluminum body and U has exchangeable bottom caps. P has a white magic display, which add extra white stripe to RGB, but has only HD screen. U has a cute gimmick in Prism which illuminates to match the colour of photos viewed in the gallery or the album art of music tracks currently playing, but it has an only 5 pixel camera.
Meanwhile in Japna, waterproof Xperia, acro HD will be released for Docomo, which has almost same spec as Xperia S but looks more (or just) like Nokia Lumina 800.
 |
| Xperia acro HD (will be released in Mar, 2012) |
 |
| looks exactly the same lol |
I'm not here trying to say Sony had been a copy dog for the design of this phone. Both of these phones are designed in North Euro, so it is likey the same designers are involved in both products, isn't it.
Xperia S's transparent line reminds me the joy of decorative minimal design, and that has been long forgotten mainly because of Apple. Apple's design is simple and genuine, and never put what we can call decoration except "bitten Apple". It somehow has become dull and bland enough that can be dubbed as a safety choice, not something that buying the one send a message.
But what makes iPhone so successful is the integrated user experience from iOS5 to iTunes to the incredible app store that seaming-lessly work together.
It's good to have two different styles of smartphone design, but with that regard iPhone is one or two steps forward to Sony and a bunch of other Android phones that few people can differentiate.
It's good to have two different styles of smartphone design, but with that regard iPhone is one or two steps forward to Sony and a bunch of other Android phones that few people can differentiate.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)