Tributes came from all over the world to Kenzo Takada, who died at the American hospital in Paris.
Known for his brilliant graphics, jungle-inspired prints and eclectic use of color, he was the first Japanese designer to make his call on the Parisian fashion scene.
He moved to France in and spent the rest of his career there.
With his “almost 8,000 creations,” the Japanese designer “has never stopped celebrating and the art of living,” his spokesman said.
The mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, paid tribute to him on Twitter: “Creator of immense talent, she had given color and kindness to her position in fashion. Paris now mourns one of its children. “
“I’m a logo fan in the 1970s when it started. I think he’s a wonderful designer,” said Sidney Toledano, CEO of luxury conglomerate LVMH, owner of the Kenzo logo.
Many Japanese Twitter users posted their condolences on the platform, some of whom said their first luxury product is Kenzo.
“The first wallet I had was Kenzo,” said a Twitter user. “Even if it’s a small thing, I won’t forget it. Rest in peace.
“I have a Kenzo transmitted through my mother, ” said another.
Many others reported that they had Kenzo handkerchiefs, an accessory still found in Japan.
Born in 1939 in Himeji, near the city of Osaka, Kenzo Takada to pass by boat to Paris in 1965, when he spoke hardly French.
At first he sold sketches to fashion houses, but then spent it alone, with a small shop called Jungle Jap.
“I decorated the store myself with little money,” Takada recently told the South China Morning Post, in one of his last media interviews. “One of the first portraits I saw in Paris where I fell in love with a portrait of the jungle. . . and that inspiration for the store. “
His garments were strongly influenced by Japanese creations. Takada said she didn’t need to “do what French designers did. “
“His local Japan remained [the] source of inspiration for each and every collection he made. She has maintained the use of bright colors and volume ratios at all times,” said Circe Henestrosa, headmistress of the fashion school at Lasalle College of the Arts. Singapore.
“I think he was ahead of his time and one of the first designers to experiment with the concept of sexless fashion. She would never settle for the stereotypical concept of men’s and women’s fashion,” Ms. Henestrosa said.
Takada’s “great opportunity,” however, came when fashion magazine Elle put one of her looks on its cover, and when foreign fashion magazine editors attended her fashion show in 1971, she told SCMP.
At first, there was controversy over the logo, as Takada had called himself and his label “Jap”, a term that some in the United States discovered offensive, which he discovered when he began to reach the U. S. market.
“I knew it had a pejorative meaning,” he told the New York Times in an interview in 1972. “But I think if I did it right, it would replace the meaning. “
Takada remembered the label with her first call, and so Kenzo’s logo was born.
It has thrived and is a world-famous fashion brand, adding a line of men’s clothing in 1983, then more casual sportswear lines, Kenzo Jeans and Kenzo Jungle, followed temporarily by Kenzo perfumes and glasses.
Then, at the height of the brand’s good fortune in the 1990s, Takada sold it to LVMH.
“The hardest year of my life 1990, when my spouse Xavier passed away and my business spouse suffered a stroke,” he told SCMP. “That’s why I sold the company to LVMH [in 1993]. I felt like I couldn’t do it on my own.
He remained on the label for a few years and retired in 1999 at the age of 60.
But even in his retirement, he remained creatively active, designing costumes for opera and painting productions.
“He only intended to be in Paris for two years [but] he spent the rest of his life there. He took Paris through the storm,” Henestrosa said.
“As [fashion journalist] Suzy Menkes said, “she sought to make satisfied clothes. “His avant-garde paintings Array . . . is dissatisfied when artistic minds like Kenzo leave this world. “