Comme des Garçons has brought back Six, the print publication it used to issue, after 35 years. The house is distributing it as a direct-mail piece for customers, and an exhibition of its page images is running at the Aoyama flagship store in Tokyo through the end of November.
Several large cylindrical panels printed with photographs stand from near the entrance through the interior of the store in Minami-Aoyama. The photographs appeared in Six.
A catalog without prices
Six was founded in 1988. It came out twice a year, and eight issues were produced in all. By then many brands had begun making fashion catalogs that listed product descriptions, prices and materials.
Comme des Garçons had already been producing its own image catalogs without price information. Designer Rei Kawakubo has said that as catalogs became commonplace, she felt more strongly that she wanted to make something different.
Six grew out of that wish. The name comes from the sixth sense. It was not meant to be expressed in words, numbers or theory, nor to be simply fashion photography. It was meant to express the spirit of Comme des Garçons itself.
At Kawakubo's direction, the fashion journalist and editor Atsuko Kozashi, who has died, worked on the editing, and art director Tsuguya Inoue handled the design.
Reviving the title puts an old format back in front of customers at a moment when the brand's image-making is again the subject of exhibitions and new collections. The panels in the Aoyama store carry photographs from the original issues rather than new work.