In the spring of 2005, I wanted to start a new business venture for my company. I was aimlessly walking around Osaka, where our office was located at the time, when I happened to notice a fabric in a select shop.
It was a combination of yarn-dyed chambray in solid blue, stripes, and checks. The indescribable depth of blue caught my attention, and I was excited when I asked the shop assistant about it. They told me it was made with indigo-dyed threads.
Blue is also a color that symbolizes "Worker," and the details of that shirt indeed followed the style of work shirts: triple-stitched seams, cat's eye buttons, and washed puckering.
All of those elements instantly touched my "instinct." That was my first encounter with "Banshu-ori" and the beginning of "BasShu."
Later, to acquire the fabric, I visited Nishiwaki City, Hyogo Prefecture, the production center of Banshu-ori. I saw the weaving factories with my own eyes and was impressed by the skills and pride of the craftsmen.
I didn't just want good design; I wanted to infuse the product with "the story backed by the history of the creators" and strongly felt the desire to convey that.
In this world, good design is expected. Many people create things they believe are good, but I wondered if there wasn't more that could be conveyed. However, no matter how good the fabric is, design is crucial as a means of expression to communicate it to people.
At that time, we didn't have a designer in-house, so I took the shapes and details of pockets from my own work shirts and pants, created handwritten patterns, and consulted with a sewing factory to produce the first sample. This is the product in our BASIC series, which continues to this day.
I was also particular about the brand's logo. I found it difficult to explain my vision to others, so I decided it would be quickest to create it myself. However, I had no artistic talent and no design software at the company, so I leveraged Excel, the only program I could use, to create the logo design.
What I felt at that time was not about business, but a strong desire for how something that deeply moved me could resonate with others. Even today, that feeling remains unchanged. I believe that my current path is a continuous pursuit of resonance with what I genuinely find good. As a manufacturer, it brings me great joy to see that circle of resonance expand to individual consumers through the stores that carry our products, and that circle is now about to cross the seas.
Even if there's a language barrier, "good things are good"—that's the communicative power of objects, I believe. I intend to continue expanding this circle of resonance as much as possible.
