Japanese Jeans

I read your book published last year, "AMETORA: How Japan Saved American Style." It is extremely well-researched and I think it is a wonderful scholarly work.

Thank you. When I was writing it, the materials in your book, "History: Japanese Jeans," were very helpful as a reference.

What inspired you to write this book?

Personally, I originally had no interest in clothes or fashion at all. But that is probably normal for an American man (laughs).

A three-week homestay in Japan during high school inspired me to study Japan. In the late 90s, the "Ura-Harajuku" movement became a boom among Japanese youth. They would wait in line for hours to buy T-shirts. I became very interested in why Japanese youth were so passionate about clothing. Previously, Mita-hyoron (official monthly journal published by Keio University Press) featured a three-person casual talk about Ivy fashion (May 2014 issue). The English version of the book "TAKE IVY," created in 1965 by Toshiyuki Kurosu, a key figure in the Ivy boom, was released in the US in 2010 and became quite a topic of conversation.

I see.

It was very intriguing why Japanese people made a book about Ivy fashion in 1965, so I first thought about writing a book about Japanese Ivy. However, I heard from my publisher that Japanese jeans were also very popular overseas, so I decided to look into that as well. I thought the question of why Japanese people started making such good jeans was very interesting.

"AMETORA" was released in English in 2015, and the Japanese version came out last September. A Chinese version was also just released the other day.

That's amazing. What kind of people are reading it?

Since the title is "Ametora," people tend to think it's a book about Ivy, but the people reading it most overseas are probably denim enthusiasts. There are many Japanese denim enthusiasts particularly in Europe. For those people, there don't seem to be many books that tell the story of Japanese denim like this.

Today, Japanese jeans are viewed with the most respect in the world. They are considered the most authentic. Even though they were originally born in America. That's why brands that want to make authentic jeans in America will absolutely use Japanese denim. It has become a mindset of "it's not real unless it's Japanese denim." In a sense, this is close to a miracle.

Thinking again about why Japanese jeans became the best in the world, after the war, the US occupation forces donated worn-out jeans to churches for charity, especially at the Atsugi base. Japanese people began to wear them out of admiration. But since it was charity, the quantity wasn't that large.

There was a shop called Marcel in Ameyoko, Ueno, and the founder, Kenichi Hiyama, started it by thinking, "This will sell." That was the starting point. From there, manufacturers in Okayama took it up, and what they suddenly realized was, "Wait, Japan has aizome (indigo dyeing)." Even within aizome, there are dozens of shades of "indigo." People of my grandmother's generation could name all those colors. That's how much of an aizome culture Japan had. They focused on dyeing, believing this could be used for jeans and that we were the best in the world when it came to indigo.

That's an interesting point. When you dye jeans with Japanese "hon-aizome" (natural indigo dyeing), the quality is actually a bit too high. In other words, the indigo penetrates to the core, so the color doesn't fade much (laughs).

In America, they use a technique called rope dyeing (bundling cotton threads into a rope shape for dyeing), which is cheaper. Kaihara in Hiroshima was the first to adopt this in Japan.

In other words, Kaihara felt they had to imitate America, so despite Japan's long-standing aizome culture, they dared to use the American method where the color fades easily.

Entering the 90s, brands emerged that mixed the old aizome culture with American dyeing methods.

Another thing is the "selvedge" (red-ear) in jeans (photo). The edges of the fabric are distinguished by red "colored threads," which act as a fraying preventer.

Selvedge appears when weaving with old-fashioned machines called shuttle looms. Nowadays, such machines aren't used because they are inefficient. So in America and other developed countries, those old machines were discarded long ago. However, Japanese factory managers and craftsmen kept the shuttle looms in barns because they felt it was a waste to throw them away.

The "501," which could be called the synonym for Levi's, originally had selvedge. But Americans didn't think "selvedge is cool" at all. It was just something that happened to appear out of necessity in the manufacturing process.

Even in Japan, 70s denim didn't have selvedge. As jeans became popular, enthusiasts somehow felt the 501 had a better texture and color fading, and they noticed the existence of the selvedge. So, in the 80s, they went out of their way to use small looms—probably canvas looms—to make denim with selvedge.

In other words, it didn't happen naturally; when they tried to imitate America, they tried to imitate parts that Americans hadn't even noticed. It's a very artificial history.

That's fascinating.

Until Japanese brands like EVISU started selling in the US and UK in the 1990s, almost no one over there cared about selvedge. It was only after Japanese brands said "selvedge is good" or "this is very 501-like" that Westerners finally realized "selvedge denim is cool."

Now, even overseas, denim enthusiasts will only buy things with selvedge. That is entirely a case of Japanese people reviving an American culture.

Levi's made selvedge jeans until 1984, but not after 1985. The denim fabric for Levi's had been made at the White Oak plant of Cone Mills in North Carolina, which had old shuttle looms but wasn't using them. But when they noticed that factories in Okayama, Japan, were using them, they decided to imitate them, and Cone Mills started making selvedge denim again.

However, that factory closed last year, and now there isn't a single factory in America that can make selvedge denim. But they remain in Japan. So, I think this has truly become a uniquely Japanese product.

Japanese people have a spirit of valuing old things and not throwing them away. In other words, it's not just about efficiency and low cost; a culture remained in the jeans industry where things sell if the texture and color are good, even if they are expensive. That continues even today.

That's true. I'm in my 50s, and our generation is already tired of buying things. Like, we've bought so much, we're good now (laughs). I think many people in the generation that has finished raising children have a mindset of wanting to live more carefully.

A few years ago, there was a large reunion for the 25th anniversary of graduating from Keio, and the conversation there was that everyone used to buy a lot, but now we feel that wasn't quite right. I think there's a trend toward living a more grounded life.

The more you wear jeans, the cooler they look. Isn't this a characteristic that only jeans possess among all clothing?

Japanese denim is a bit expensive overseas and is seen as a luxury item in a sense. In other words, like Hermès or Vuitton bags, they are expensive but can be used for a lifetime. So, with stiff and thick denim, it's hard to wear at first, but it feels like there's a story embedded in it, like "you can really wear these for your whole life."

Regarding denim materials, various technologies are advancing now, such as stretch processing for ease of wear.

However, the reason Japanese denim is so highly regarded overseas is actually because it doesn't have stretch. It's because it's thick, stiff, and has good color fading, exactly like denim from the 50s. Jeans from Kaihara or Nihon Menpu in Japan have no stretch and no artificial fibers. That is what is considered good.

Think about fast food. Essentially, it's about eating anything as long as it's cheap and plentiful. On the other hand, the gourmet boom is also huge. Clothing is the same; various fast fashion brands are dominating the fashion world, but I think that's a bit different from the original Japanese jeans culture.

Hamburgers are American fast food, but the first McDonald's in Japan was located in Ginza. In other words, at the time, it was quite a high-class item, close to a luxury good. Jeans are similar to that.

After that, the quality of materials also dropped in America.

I think that's because jeans were very common in America from the start and weren't anything special. In other words, they are cool, but they are anti-fashion. You wear jeans because you don't think about what to wear; you wear jeans because you don't think about status. That's why hippies wore them, and people like James Dean wore them as an anti-social image. Jeans were purely functional, not fashion.

But in Japan, jeans were a special fashion that came from America. That's why they were cherished, and when the quality of American jeans gradually declined, Japanese people must have wondered why the quality was dropping for such a special fashion item.

Ah, I see.

So, Japanese brands thought about making slightly higher-end jeans. However, in the 80s, when Big John first released expensive selvedge denim under the "Big John Rare" brand, it didn't sell at all. The same was true for the brand Studio D'Artisan.

In Japan, jeans were fashion from the start. But in America, they were an extension of workwear. That's likely the background.

From a designer's perspective, major apparel companies developed jeans as something that could make you stylish very quickly. I was doing children's clothing for Celine and Burberry in the 2000s, and advice came from the licensors to always include "jeaning" (denim elements).

In other words, Japanese fashion can sometimes become too serious and stiff. I think they wanted a bit of playfulness, or something slightly anti-establishment—a bit of a "tickle."

So we tried to incorporate jeaning as fashion, but as time went on through the 2000s and 2010s, even in women's clothing, it felt like it became quite superficial—like you could just wear denim and it would somehow work.

I felt that instead of just using denim as a quick means, there might be more that Japanese jeans fashion could communicate.

I've also been looking at women's jeans for about 30 years. In the 70s, there were hippie-style flared jeans, and eventually, there were designer jeans like Calvin Klein. Slim-fitting ones that you could even wear into a hotel. Then women's jeans finally gained mainstream acceptance, and after a while, colored jeans appeared.

In Japan, there's the term "leg-lengthening jeans." These are things that fit the body line perfectly and include stretch. They were successfully marketed by linking them with women's desire for beauty and looking good. So, while it's a bit different from the obsession in men's jeans, I want to value the connection between jeans and the female desire to "look beautiful" and "look healthy."

For me, wearing the same size denim as when I was in my 20s has become a theme. Denim is quite honest, so it's quite a challenge (laughs). However, I have a desire to be an old lady who can go out wearing a white T-shirt and blue jeans. I want to keep my inches properly and not cheat with stretch (laughs).

As a current campaign in the jeans industry, we are trying to promote the idea of changing your body by wearing jeans. We're trying to create an image of exercising and moving briskly so that your stomach doesn't stick out.

I think it means the social role of jeans has changed. Especially for women, jeans that are far removed from stories like 501s or selvedge are popular.

On the other hand, there are still many jeans enthusiasts who want to continue the old culture. Of course, there are such people in America and Europe, but I was most surprised by Thailand and Indonesia. Indonesia is more humid and hot than Japan, right? But Indonesian men love extremely thick jeans, around 20 ounces. Even right under the equator, that culture is popular. In other words, they aren't wearing them because it's rational, and it's a bit different from wearing them because they're trendy. As "clothing with a story," jeans are still incredibly strong. In the past, you might have automatically put on jeans because you didn't want to think about anything when you woke up, but that's no longer the case.

What is the position of jeans in America today?

Of course, they are still an everyday presence, but on the other hand, they have also become something for fashion-conscious men.

Since about 10 years ago, various indie denim brands have emerged in America. The denim itself is probably mostly Japanese-made, but as brands, they are not for the masses at all. Rather, brands are emerging with a stance of not wanting to be for the masses.

Are those brands leading the way as fashion leaders?

I feel like that trend is starting to disappear now.

There are terms like "Cold War" and "Civil War," but America today is in a state of what you might call a "Cold Civil War." For example, the pro-Trump and anti-Trump factions are in such conflict it's almost like a civil war. The elites in New York, San Francisco, and Los Angeles probably like jeans and Japanese denim. But those people have absolutely no influence over the pro-Trump people in the middle of America. Conversely, it's like, "If those guys are wearing them, I'm definitely not wearing them."

There's a fashion style called normcore (normal + core = a style referring to "extremely ordinary clothes"), like Apple's Steve Jobs, and I thought people in the IT industry probably liked denim quite a bit.

That's right. I feel the number of people among them who understand that Japanese denim is good is gradually increasing.

Since around 2005 or 2006, people in America have started talking about things like "how the denim fades" on the internet. Actually, there isn't a word for it in English, so the Japanese word "tateochi" (vertical fading) is now understood in English as is.

Tateochi is the sensation that there are irregularities in the thickness of the warp threads, and when rubbed, the white becomes mottled, which is considered wonderful.

Things with such irregularities originally had no value, didn't they?

I think "slub yarn" (irregular yarn) is also a topic that only comes up with Japanese jeans. In the 80s, Kurabo (Kurashiki Spinning) developed "slub yarn" that intentionally had irregularities. The way it's made is also high-tech, with the appearance of the irregularities being precisely programmed. If you go to a Japanese denim factory today, there are almost no humans; robots are mostly making it.

Many large, state-of-the-art high-tech machines are running, making yarn that looks like old denim from the 50s. This idea of using high-tech to create something old is exactly a Japanese way of thinking, I believe.

Behind that high-tech is tradition, a sense that non-uniform things like fukure-ori (puffed weaving), mottled weaving, or kasuri (ikat) in kimono also have meaning.

Broadly speaking, I think Western culture believes that uniform and flat is better. Even with Levi's, Americans used to wear brand new ones or non-wash ones that had just been dipped in hot water. After the war, trade was liberalized and new denim fabric from America entered Japan, but it was too stiff to wear. So, the folks in Okayama started washing them in washing machines. In the process, holes would open up too.

The streak-like color fading around the crotch is called "hige" (whiskers), and Japanese people started calling it that too. Italian people were doing it even earlier, but it was Okayama, Japan, that marketed it to America and turned it into a business.

Kurabo's slub yarn was actually sold to a French brand first, rather than a Japanese brand.

First, the French thought the 501 was great and made something like a knock-off of it. Seeing those French 501s, it became a topic in Japanese men's fashion magazines, with people saying things like "The French are wearing 501s." So, the 501 first gained attention in France and Japan, while Americans didn't particularly think anything of it. They thought it was just ordinary, but then in '84 they did another 501 campaign, and Americans realized again that the 501 was the most authentic pair of jeans, and that became the global trend.

Currently, about 2 to 2.3 billion pairs of jeans are produced and sold worldwide. As outerwear, this is probably number one. Because of that, everything—cotton cultivation, weaving, dyeing, sewing, sales, logistics—is on a massive scale. Therefore, the social impact is also enormous.

Farmers are suffering from pesticide damage, lakes have dried up due to the massive use of water, and dyes are polluting rivers and lakes. Also, there was a collapse accident at a garment factory in Bangladesh, and hundreds of women working for low wages died. At that time, people in the West made a fuss, starting a movement saying, "The jeans we are wearing are made by women working in terrible conditions in those factories; should we really be happy wearing these?"

Exactly, and I think it's precisely because of those problems that Japanese denim is attracting attention.

There is a brand from Kojima, Okayama called "KAPITAL," and they market the story that their Japanese denim is made in a factory in Kojima. Japanese brands are trustworthy because you know where they are made. There is also a trend where people want to buy and wear things made by artisans. It's the same as saying an Hermès bag is made by a craftsman in this specific factory.

Japanese brands are good at creating stories; even though Japanese denim factories are full of robots, they project an image of an elderly craftsman working diligently and struggling with an old loom (laughs).

Recently, a fashion magazine for women in their 40s and older had a feature titled "What Intellectual Women Wear." Just as you see with organic food, everyone wants to buy things where the origin is known.

And for clothing, are people really happy buying something for 3,900 yen that was made by someone working in unfair labor conditions? I think things are gradually changing because people want to engage in more ethical purchasing.

Also, being in the field of children's clothing, there are times when we are forced to make cheap things, but in that magazine, there were words that really stung: "Please don't create any more wasteful designs that encourage wasteful consumption." Designers must not make wasteful things anymore. I want to do work that is truly meaningful. Of course, it is a business, but as a designer's mindset, I want to take to heart the idea of "not making wasteful things."

Levi's released something called "noragi" (farm wear) in a 501 campaign. They reproduced the kind of patchwork Japanese farmers used to wear using denim. This feels like a Japanese sensibility, or rather, it feels like we've entered that kind of era.

The word "boro" is also quite well understood in English now.

The word "ethical" literally translates to "rinriteki," but I think it encompasses various meanings like traceability, sustainability, and fair trade (trading at fair prices and conditions). I believe jeans are exactly the item that can realize this ethical ideal.

As for the latest technology regarding jeans, there is something called laser processing, where finished jeans are blasted with a 1,000-degree laser beam. This can create a faded look. This method is environmentally friendly because it doesn't use water or chemicals.

Also, it's common for robots to rub the fabric to give it a worn-out feel. And research has begun on the full automation of sewing. In other words, you put in fabric and it comes out as a finished product.

After the war, American jeans manufacturers kept lowering costs, and the quality got worse and they became uncool. Japanese jeans brands value that quality very much. That's why Japan is really the only place in the world where authentic jeans remain.

This isn't limited to jeans; for example, Neapolitan pizza from Italy probably tastes better in Japan (laughs). The image of Japanese culture might still be things like "Geisha," "Fujiyama," and "Sushi," but there is another thing: the modern culture created by the West still remains in Japan. And actually, this now only remains in Japan.

With the technology I mentioned earlier, for example, you can make jeans that reproduce the wrinkles of the jeans worn by Takuya Kimura.

In this way, we use the latest digital technology to achieve an analog atmosphere and effect. I think this is the path Japan should take from now on. Japan fully possesses that capability.

I think that sense of handiwork is exactly Japan's strength. However, wages are high in Japan, and people in the sewing industry are quitting one after another. In a factory, people in their 60s are on the younger side. Even if you go to a factory in Kurashiki, people in their 70s are still active. Therefore, while incorporating automation technology, I hope we can further promote Japan's planning and design capabilities to create valuable things.

Since we can't compete with fast fashion on price, I felt once again that we must communicate more to Japanese users the kind of "story" discussed today—the kind that makes them feel it's worth paying the price.

Currently, the demand for jeans is flat or slightly declining. Young people in the 1970s, when jeans began to spread, were extremely enthusiastic and knowledgeable about jeans fashion, but that has faded recently, so I want to revive that somehow.

By the way, I think if Yukichi Fukuzawa were alive today, he would probably be wearing jeans (laughs). His portrait shows him in a casual kimono, but he disliked formal samurai clothing because it was a symbol of the feudal system. He liked free clothing, so in that sense, if jeans had existed, I think he would have said, "Hey, let me try those on."

I see, that might be true (laughs). *Affiliations and titles are as of the time of the interview.