Kimono: Kyoto to Catwalk

Beautifully illustrated, Anna Jackson’s Kimono includes more than 200 kimono from collections at the V&A and around the world, as well as examples of the ways in which they have been represented in paintings, prints, and photographs, and interpreted in popular culture and fashion, from Björk to David Bowie, John Galliano to Issey Miyake. The kimono—worn by women, men, and children—is the ultimate signifier of Japan: revered within the country as the embodiment of national culture and regarded internationally as an exotic fascination. Often viewed as a simple, unchanging garment, the kimono has been equated with” tradition” and seen as something static and timeless. This book, published to accompany a major exhibition at the V&A, London, presents the kimono as dynamic and fashionable and explores its significance in historical and contemporary contexts, both in Japan and in the West. “The kimono . . . cannot simply belong to Japan, or it will disappear. This is not a ceremonial garment. It’s fashion; it always has been. And fashion is for everybody.” —Vogue, Jataro Saito