It was bright vs. dark at this season's 2009/10 Japan Fashion Week and Tokyo Collections, with dizzying color and details contrasting with a plethora of shows that chose to go simple and monochromatic.
Matohu, one of the most-watched brands of JFW, presented a show titled Kabukimono, borrowing the name of celebrated outlaws in the Keichou Era (1596-1615) who were outlandish in both lifestyle and dress. However, designers Hiroyuki Horihata and Makiko Sekiguchi turned that on its head by instead doing the collection all in black, making it immensely chic, sleek, and now — while their experimentation with fabric, such as woven Jacquard, only compounded their hard-earned coolness.
Mintdesigns ' Hokuto Katsui and Nao Yagi showed off their own rebellious side with a gritty show in the parking basement under Tokyo Tower. Models wore colored allergy masks they called "deathmasks," headpieces of thorns, and clothes printed with barbed wire and bugs in dark purple, deep red and gray. It was avant garde even for Mintdesigns, and it's easy to see why the edgy brand has been garnering attention in Italy, the Middle East and Russia.