Public eye #36

Hiroshi Endo, designer

‘Designer’, as in fashion designer?
HE: Yeah, I’ve been working in fashion for quite a while now. [Laughs]

What kind of garments do you design?
HE: Usually, the kind of garments I tend to wear myself [laughs]; like the clothes I have on today, in fact – tuxedo jeans and a knit shirt, both made from organic cotton.

What led you to become a fashion designer?
HE: When I made the decision to study fashion, fashion was all I could think about; there simply wasn’t anything else I wanted to do. After attending fashion school, I spent some time in Europe and then later decided to go to New York after receiving an invitation from a friend there.

You weren’t too keen on the idea of simply staying in Japan then?
HE: I felt that my life in Japan, and in Ibaraki where I grew up, was too comfortable and that my overly comfortable existence here might somehow hinder me in later life [laughs] – hence my decision to try living abroad.

What did you do in New York?
HE: I worked as an assistant designer whilst attending language school. In total, I spent about six or seven years there – during which, the designer I was assisting began taking on work from a Japanese company, which, in turn, gradually began to give me more and more cause to come back to Japan.

So what’s you impression of America?
HE: It’s a land full of opportunities; maybe ‘opportunities’ isn’t quite the right word, but it’s definitely a place where you can get your foot in the door. In contrast to Japan, it's very multicultural, so there are no real norms as such. The only real controlling factor is the law, which is perhaps why there’s more opportunity; given the right starting point, I think it's a place where just about anyone can succeed. Plus, some of the values there simply don’t exist in Japan – which is something else I feel privileged to have learnt.

More from Hiroshi:

‘I work on the edge of Aoyama. [Laughs] I wanted to work in a location that people come to with the mind to buy something; we’re on the edge, but we’re still in Aoyama.’ [Laughs]

‘My ideal future would be spent as a part-time fashion designer and as a part-time farmer – I’d like to spend exactly half my time in fashion and the other half in farming.’ [Laughs]

‘I like the atmosphere around Koenji; it’s a place that still has a certain kind of retro feel to it.’

Carroll Gardens Works: www.ny11231.com/