A Brief History Of Rei Kawakubo And Her Brand Comme Des Garçons.

Writer(s): Christian Orr

Editor(s): Juliet Baah

Last edit: 2/16/19 4:49pm

Popular Comme Des Garçons Play Collection piece with the iconic play heart logo. @tellytnh on instagram

Today, it is rare to see a brand so prominent in street-wear/fashion culture created from the ground up by one woman. Rei Kawakubo, the creator of Comme des Garçons and Dover Street Market, has done that and has broken many barriers in fashion owning one of the most prominent fashion brands of today. Starting in Tokyo she became one of the most serious designers in fashion and using punk and contemporary aesthetics to create fashion for women using dark gothic and light punk tones in her clothing. She also went on to create one of her most famous collections, Comme Des Garçons (CDG) Play, which includes the famous Play Heart logo. Though expensive, her CDG Tricot and CDG Homme Plus Evergreen, and Junya Watanabe CDG collections are all handmade in France. The rest of her clothing is mainly produced in Spain, France, and Turkey. She sells her luxury clothing along with a few other brands in her retail business Dover Street Market.

She began her craft in Keio University, a private university in Tokyo Japan, which her father worked at as an administrator. At Keio she studied and got a degree in the history of aesthetics which studied Asian and Western art. She graduated in 1964. Afterwards she left home and moved to Harajuku in Tokyo, Japan, where she found a job in the advertising department for a Textile Manufacturer known as Asahi Kasei which deals in chemical and material science. There she had a reluctance to wear the company's uniform. However, her boss did not care and let her express her creative freedom in how she dressed. Together they set up photo shoots using different props and costumes. Rei soon after became a stylist and also designed her own clothing. In 1969, she started to produce sportswear and sold her clothing through stores such as Belle Boudoir. She also rented an office space and hired assistants who still work with her today in Comme Des Garçons. Later on in 1973, Comme Des Garçons was established as a company.

By 1980, CDG had stores across Japan and gained around thirty million dollars a year with only eighty employees. In 1981, CDG had its debut in Paris and opened an office there along with staging the first Commes Des Garçons fashion show. One of the important leading themes in her work was punk around this time and was very conceptual. She very much identified with punk and uses it as a common aspect of most of her work. With her clothing and heart in fashion, Rei inspires and influences many of today's fashion designers. In the 2000’s Commes Des Garçons became a staple in fashion culture, staying consistent with new pieces annually with the usual Fall, Winter, Spring, Summer collections. In 2017, Rei’s work was put in a Costume Institute Exhibit at the Metropolitan Museum of Art which included more than 100 CDG pieces from Rei. This was the first exhibit at the museum that would feature work from a living artist since 1983. Today her work is still very adequate to todays fashion culture. Her clothing never fails to appeal to the eye with its conceptual designs and that is what makes Commes Des Garçons so great.