Rei Kawakubo

Rei Kawakubo (川久保 玲, Kawakubo Rei, born 11 October 1942) is a Japanese fashion designer, founder of Comme des Garçons.

Career

She is an untrained fashion designer, but studied fine arts and literature at Keio University. After graduation, Kawakubo worked in a textile company and began working as a freelance stylist in 1967.

In 1973, she established her own company, Comme des Garçons Co. Ltd in Tokyo and opened up her first boutique there in 1975. Starting out with women's clothes, Kawakubo added a men's line in 1978. Three years later, she started presenting her fashion lines in Paris each season, opening up a boutique in Paris in 1982.

Comme des Garçons specialises in anti-fashion, austere, sometimes deconstructed garments. During the 1980s, her garments were primarily in black, dark grey or white. The materials were often draped around the body and featured frayed, unfinished edges along with holes and a general asymmetrical shape. Challenging the established notions of beauty she created an uproar at her debut Paris fashion show where journalists labeled her clothes 'Hiroshima chic' amongst other things. Since the late 1980s, her colour palette has grown somewhat.