The origins of Takahiro Miyashita’s eponymous label, TAKAHIROMIYASHITA TheSoloist., are biographically simple enough. After leaving influential, avant garde, cult label Number (N)ine, the visionary designer wasted no time in founding a new venture that would showcase a completely unrestrained, unfiltered execution of his creative energies. But there’s something more at play than the literal, biographical details. The word soloist can’t help but conjure images of virtuoso musicianship; the kind of mastery of craft that allows the performer is operating on some kind of higher artistic plane.
Fashion, in general, finds the journey towards this higher plane more fraught with obstacles than other artistic endeavors. Fashion might be granted some indulgences, like the haute couture runway show, where it may be allowed to exist as pure aesthetics, but once it returns from the cordoned off arena of fine arts, demands are placed. What is it for? A master violinist, on the other hand, would very rarely find “the point” of the music being played called into question. The mere fact of its existence and the intangible, sensory pleasures to be derived from it prove to be sufficient justification.
They are always asking a writer why he does not write like somebody else, or a painter why he does not paint like somebody else, quite oblivious of the fact that if either of them did anything of the kind he would cease to be an artist. – Oscar Wilde
TAKAHIROMIYASHITA TheSoloist. is, for sure, operating on a different plane, but it isn’t about being intentionally difficult and inaccessible. This is art in one of the most basic senses of the word. The label’s radically altered interpretations of basic, familiar shapes ultimately exist to make the world that much more visually interesting. You’ll see the starting points, hoodie, flight jacket, beanie, etc and immediately have an expectation to go along with them. But you haven’t actually seen them yet, and definitely never like this.
