I'm increasingly stuck in my own bundle of interests. Not noticing new things, but noticing connections between the old ones. I don't really know how to write about those things, so I'm going to start noting down the fragments and then maybe do some sort of cyber crazy wall essay later. This might be for a bit of wall labelled - Fashion & Authenticity
These are two moments from the splendid Ametora: How Japan Saved American Style by W. David Marx:
“IN AUGUST 1969, JUST DAYS AFTER THE WOODSTOCK MUSIC festival, illustrator Yasuhiko Kobayashi and Heibon Punch editor Jir Ishikawa walked into a Doubleday bookstore in New York City, where they came upon an entire wall covered with a single magazine. Its cover photograph showed a “blue marble” Earth floating above the moon in the blackest of outer space. The title read: “Whole Earth Catalog, access to tools.”
“Unbeknownst to the two men upon their first encounter, this magazine would not just shape Japanese fashion for the 1970s, but forever change the look of all Japanese magazines.”
Here's an example of that sort of thing:
Not as catalogue-y as some of them but you can see what it's like. I love these magazines. I used to buy all the US/UK mens style press but I never read the articles or looked at the photo spreads. I just loved the little pictures of things that had been deemed by someone the best example of that thing. Japanese people apparently took inspiration from the Whole Earth catalogue and made whole magazines out of those pages. And you feel like they really do their homework. They've actually chosen the best thing.
It reminds me of a William Gibson quote from You Can Find Inspiration In Everything. I can't find it now, but it's something like: if you want to know what's good about what your country makes, look at what the British and Japanese import.
