Today is scheduled the U.S. release of the new fragment x Air Jordan 3, spotted a few months ago by Hiroshi Fujiwara founder of fragment design, and we take this opportunity to tell you his story.
When we talk about Hiroshi Fujiwara we are talking about a real legend. A legacy lasting more than 30 years for one of the most influential personalities in the history of contemporary fashion and more precisely of streetwear culture.
Born in 1964 in the small town of Ise, located in the Kii peninsula in the center of di Mie prefecture in the Kansai region, Fujiwara moved to Tokyo at the age of 18, fascinated by culture, music and Western style, he went to London where he fell in love with the punk-rock scene in the English capital and where he met Malcom McLaren, manager of the Sex Pistols and husband of Vivienne Westwood, who suggested he go to New York.
His trips to the Big Apple in the early 80s gave him the opportunity to get in touch with the hip hop culture, of which he became a great fan, to the point of buying records in the United States and taking them to Tokyo and playing them in clubs. He became one of the first Japanese hip hop producers and DJs and contributed in a decisive way to the diffusion of the genre and the culture itself related to hip hop.
He soon became a landmark and one of the fathers of the Ura-Harajuku scene in Tokyo’s Shibuya district, one of the world’s leading street culture districts.
His passion for pop culture then became the bridge that allowed him to get in touch with people like Shawn Stussy and be part of the International Stussy Tribe, a collective of individuals that reflected the brand’s philosophy based on rebellion that came from punk, reggae relaxation and the chill mentality of surfers. The International Stussy Tribe was a group of unlikely people, all friends and confidants of Shawn’s, from the most diverse influences that created something incredible.
The foundations of the enormous impact that Hiroshi Fujiwara had on Japanese street culture first and on global streetwear later, are all in the column “Last Orgy” written and conceived in 1987 by Fujiwara himself and published by the independent magazine “Takarajima”.
In 1990 he founded his first brand GOODENOUGH, characterized by the graphics of a very young Shinichiro Nakamura aka Sk8Thing, the mind behind Cav Empt, and was the forerunner of the limited edition of the garments.
Fujiwara was also fundamental for the affirmation of two other key characters of streetculture, NIGO and Jun Takahashi who opened the NOWHERE store thanks to him.
At the end of the 90s the Tokyo street scene exploded all over the world while Fujiwara was right in the middle of it, GOODENOUGH became fragment design, its main project.
The explosive impact of Fujiwara’s aesthetic approach influenced the entire contemporary fashion scene, from high fashion to skate brands, from Louis Vuitton to Supreme.
For over 30 years now, Fujiwara has represented the very essence of the streetwear concept and has cemented its position thanks to projects such as Nike HTM – Hiroshi Fujiwara (H), Tinker Hatfield (T) and Mark Parker (M) – one of Beaverton’s most innovative and successful.
UNDERCOVER, BAPE, HUMAN MADE are just a few examples that tell even better how Hiroshi Fujiwara has changed streetculture forever since 1980 and for decades to come.
