From the birth of the Made in Japan Style to the most beloved Collaborations of Street Culture.
“Some people work like a band, others like an orchestra. I work as a soloist.”
The double lightning bolt seal has become one of the most recognizable logos in the world, on a par with the LV Monogram. Thus, designer Hiroshi Fujiwara-with his Fragment Design brand-has exerted an unquantifiable influence on fashion and street culture, creating consumer products, collaborating with everyone from Nike and Louis Vuitton to Moncler, via Levi’s, Stussy, Supreme, Starbucks and even Pokemon and Maserati.
Its story starts in the late 1980s in Harajuku, a district where Tokyo’s major subcultures were born; all the way to the top of the fashion, hype and music world.
Read the story of Hiroshi Fujiwara and the three Cool Kids from Tokyo who invented Japanese streetwear here.
An unstoppable 30-year climb that continues to this day.
Musician, Designer, Consultant, Creative Director-some might say Fujiwara is the archetypal multifaceted character that so defines Mainstream culture today. But he is much more than each of these things: he is the one who first defined a type of creative that cannot be labeled in a single definition, in a single sphere.
Anything that gives him the opportunity to express his being captures his attention. Be it fashion, art, music and the world of Sneakers, making “super cool” everything he touches and rightly deserving the appellation “Arbiter of Cool.” Suffice it to say that in the 1980s and 1990s, models such as Nike Dunk, Court Force, Air Jordan, adidas Campus and Superstar, Jack Purcell, and North Wave became wildly popular in Japan just because they were worn by him.
In this editorial, we will focus on Fragment Design collaborations that have in some way shaped the world of Street Culture.