Continuing on from our coverage of Juvenile Hall Rollcall’s military regime themed collection we find the other side of the Honey’s Dead partnership focusing on the other side of the equation – the oppressed. It must be said before we begin that there are certain topics that I can’t help but feel are off limits to fashion, and at first glance a collection themed around Anne Frank would almost certainly fall into that category, but delve a little deeper and you will find this is more than shock tactics and is trying to say something of value. The designer is a keen skater and has grown up around re-appropriated iron crosses, eagles and Stars of David, which have always been a staple of skate and street art culture. In this collection those ideas come back to roost and are acknowledged for the bad taste that they are and will always be, no matter how diluted that original meaning may become.
It is clearly an important reference for the designer who grew up in Tokyo skater culture to acknowledge these references, and can surely only ever come from someone who lives in the Tokyo underground such as Hiro. Whether you could wear this abroad or not is something I will leave you to decide, but it will be interesting to see how this turns up on the streets of Harajuku in time. Discounting the wearer, at least at inception it is certainly immune from ignorance and from talking to Hiro I can assure you that his intentions are good and meaning positive, even if there are some nods to bad taste culture at times.
Aside from the theme Hiro is chanelling the late 80s and early 90s in both styling and early 90s Shibuya skate culture fit.
But there are some nods to a progressive silhouette in line with his friends and fellow designers at brands like Balmung and Bodysong.
The prints are probably the most difficult aspect of the collection to deal with from my perspective, so quite the reverse of 90 percent of Japanese brands we talk about on this site.
In this coat you can start to see some of the skater references given a darker twist.
Even though this collection may lack the ridiculously heavy fabrics that Hiro likes to use, there are some nice showpieces like the hand embroidered rotting apple above.
There are a couple of Common Sleeve items in the collection as ever – including the great coat above.
Needless to say, the look is totally unisex and open to interpretation.
I would be interested to know what people think of this one, and if you want a closer look we will have showroom coverage for you very soon.
for me i think it would of more interesting if it was about the strong right wing politics in japan, rather that of europe, and maybe there’s a few crossed wired in japan of nazi’s being cool, but it is interesting!
out of all the collections from S/S’13, HIRO & Balmung really impressed me the most. it seems even the ‘untouchable’ subjects are finally beginning to see the light of day, and i really appreciate what hiro has done with this collection. as an american who grew up during the grunge years, this play on bad taste culture is really interesting, and i think it brings up alot of good points and ideas.
i’ve already purchased a huge majority of the printed shirts from this collection, including several of the all-over anne frank prints. i live in the USA, and i’ve gotta say, the reactions i get on the street sometimes are quite interesting; you really get to see many people’s perspectives on it. i’ve had several people ask me if i was jewish, or if it was a ‘in memorium’ kind of print. fashion that makes you think, that’s what i love about HIRO!
@ Bobby
That has really made my day to hear that. The whole point of this site is to spread Japanese fashion abroad, and sometimes I worry about whether or not it will receive the right audience – especially with this collection. So to hear that you are wearing and owning the ideas abroad is just fantastic.
I am going to meet Hiro soon and I will make sure he knows he has fans abroad.