What is a Kimono?
Originally, Kimono was the Japanese word for clothing. But
now, the word has been used to refer traditional Japanese clothing.
Typically color combinations represented either seasonal colors or political class to which one belonged.
When?
HEIAN Period (794-1192)
Kimonos as we know them today came when a new making clothing technique was developed.
Known as the straight-line cut method, it involved cutting pieces of fabric in straight lines and sewing them together. With this technique, Kimono maker did no have to concern themselves with the shape of the wearers body.
KAMAKURA Period (1192-1338) & MUROMACHI Period (1338-1573)
Men and women wore brightly colored kimonos.
Warriors dressed in colors
representing their leaders, and sometimes the battlefield was as gaudy as a fashion show.
EDO Period(1603-1868)
During this period, woodblock-printed pattern books, called hinagatabon, played a crucial role in transmitting the most fashionable designs, just as fashion magazines and catalogues do today. For example: the On-hiinagata, published in 1667.
The history of Edo-period kosode fashion will also be discussed,
through screens
andukiyo-e paintings. Among the works on view
will be the provocatively entitled screen Whose Sleeves (Tagasode)
and a selection of elegant kosode, a type of women’s kimono with “small
sleeve” openings.
The primary consumers of sumptuous kimono were the samurai, the ruling military class.Yet it was the merchant and artisan classes, or chōnin, who benefited most from the peace and prosperity of the period.
However, the rigid hierarchy of Tokugawa Japan meant that they could not use their wealth to improve their social status. Instead they had to find different outlets for their money, such as buying beautiful clothes. It was this new market that stimulated the great flowering of the textile arts in the Edo period.
The kimono developed into a highly expressive means of personal display, an important indicator of the rising affluence and aesthetic sensibility of the chōnin. There were even fashion contests between the wives of the wealthiest merchants, who tried to outdo one another with ever more dazzling displays of splendid costume.Such excesses troubled the shogunate as they threatened to upset the strict social order and sumptuous laws that restricted the kind of fabrics, techniques and colors used by the chōnin were periodically issued.
Although the laws were not consistently enforced, leading to regular shifts between opulence and restraint, they did usher in certain changes. New techniques were developed and the use of subdued colours and fabrics became increasingly common. This was part of a new aesthetic known as iki, or elegant chic, in which anyone with real taste focused on subtle details.Those with style and money also found other ways to circumvent the rules. It became very fashionable, for example, to use the highly coveted, but forbidden,color red on undergarments and linings, for these were not covered by the restrictions.
The primary consumers of sumptuous kimono were the samurai, the ruling military class.Yet it was the merchant and artisan classes, or chōnin, who benefited most from the peace and prosperity of the period.
However, the rigid hierarchy of Tokugawa Japan meant that they could not use their wealth to improve their social status. Instead they had to find different outlets for their money, such as buying beautiful clothes. It was this new market that stimulated the great flowering of the textile arts in the Edo period.
The kimono developed into a highly expressive means of personal display, an important indicator of the rising affluence and aesthetic sensibility of the chōnin. There were even fashion contests between the wives of the wealthiest merchants, who tried to outdo one another with ever more dazzling displays of splendid costume.Such excesses troubled the shogunate as they threatened to upset the strict social order and sumptuous laws that restricted the kind of fabrics, techniques and colors used by the chōnin were periodically issued.
Although the laws were not consistently enforced, leading to regular shifts between opulence and restraint, they did usher in certain changes. New techniques were developed and the use of subdued colours and fabrics became increasingly common. This was part of a new aesthetic known as iki, or elegant chic, in which anyone with real taste focused on subtle details.Those with style and money also found other ways to circumvent the rules. It became very fashionable, for example, to use the highly coveted, but forbidden,color red on undergarments and linings, for these were not covered by the restrictions.
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