Some more notes on an event I went to at the Victoria and Albert Museum: Professor Frances Corner in conversation with Yohji Yamamoto.

Photographers like August Sander and Irving Penn, especially their images of people in everyday working clothes, have influenced Yamamoto greatly. What appeals to him most are the clothes that are a functional statement, related to the body.

Often, Yamamoto chooses to hide the body, make it into a house, a house made of cloth. Then, the imagination gets to work and tries to work out what is inside the house. That, to Yamamoto, is sexier than letting it all hang out.

Yamamoto is aware that he is probably a very contrary character. Whatever is considered appropriate, polite, on trend, he runs away from. ‘I am a very twisted man!’

Yamamoto has this to say on fast fashion: ‘I am praying – don’t waste clothes.’

BDW

I went to the Victoria and Albert Museum recently to listen to Professor Frances Corner interview Yohji Yamamoto, the Japanese ‘dress maker’ as he calls himself.

Some notes on what I heard follow.

For Yamamoto, working in a studio with his assistants are his happiest moments.

He hates fashion. Most specifically, Yamamoto hates the ideas of trends influencing our choice of clothing. To Yamamoto, fashion is about air, and air moves and influences people. Yamamoto runs from this.

He is aiming to achieve timelessness in his design.

Yamamoto always thought/thinks that he is working in a totally international manner, such was, and is the influence on his work of designers like Coco Chanel, Elsa Schiaparelli, Christóbal Balenciaga. Like them, Yamamoto works hard to get the cut right. Tailoring is a big influence.

Yamamoto works so hard to get the cut right that he often forgets to imbue colour in his designs. Anyway, colour can be disturbing to his vision of the garment. If he uses colour, he uses pure, undiluted colour.

BDW