YUMI KATSURA translates delicate Japanese art into Parisian couture

Who else besides a couture designer trained at the legendary Parisian Chambre Syndicale and yet deeply anchored in her native Japanese culture, could have crafted a revival of the great Ito Jakuchu? While using inspiration by the traditional Japanese kimono, Yumi KATSURA made this essential piece become the canvas of her new collection. Her Spring/Summer 2017 couture collection showcases the designer’s art of creating extremely feminine and exquisite dresses. The starting point was naturally the beautiful fabrics and their splendid patterns, inspired by the painter’s world of flowers and animals. Under Ms. KATSURA’s talented eye, the designs received a new aesthetic to be reborn into a series of elegant garments. The couturier admits that the creative process is of the utmost importance to her which certainly explains her studying intensely the great Jakuchu’s artwork. Inspired by details and subjects from the paintings and windscreens, she then made use of the sophisticated Yuzen technique, traditionally applied to kimonos, to draw her own patterns.  

Who else besides a couture designer trained at the legendary Parisian Chambre Syndicale and yet deeply anchored in her native Japanese culture, could have crafted a revival of the great Ito Jakuchu? While using inspiration by the traditional Japanese kimono, Yumi KATSURA made this essential piece become the canvas of her new collection. Her Spring/Summer 2017 couture collection showcases the designer’s art of creating extremely feminine and exquisite dresses. The starting point was naturally the beautiful fabrics and their splendid patterns, inspired by the painter’s world of flowers and animals. Under Ms. KATSURA’s talented eye, the designs received a new aesthetic to be reborn into a series of elegant garments. The couturier admits that the creative process is of the utmost importance to her which certainly explains her studying intensely the great Jakuchu’s artwork. Inspired by details and subjects from the paintings and windscreens, she then made use of the sophisticated Yuzen technique, traditionally applied to kimonos, to draw her own patterns.  

Her collection, which pays homage to traditional art, is resolutely modern

Eventually, the splendid fabrics become shaped into beautiful dresses, all crafted in the ateliers which still maintain the very demanding techniques of couture.  Designed by Yumi KATSURA who perfectly balances volumes and shapes, the outfits showcase an interesting variety of lengths and cuts, with a very soft touch of romanticism. Pleats, laces and embroideries are discreet, applied uniquely to emphasize the silhouettes. Like the designer who has been wearing her legendary turbans for 30 years now, as she points out, models’ heads are embellished with the same pieces which give them a royal attitude. This “Journey through a Japanese garden”, tells a story full of elegance and poetry, portraying a lady who is deeply attached to her traditional values and who enjoys a blossoming life. The couture presentation even featured two male silhouettes, embodying “samurais of the urban jungle” another version of the designer’s connection between “love for tradition” and “non-compromising modernity”.

Madame KATSURA whose international reputation as a designer was built on her extraordinary wedding gowns, succeeds in creating simultaneously two types of visions: classic couture dresses and Japanese kimonos. Her aesthetic is sourced from the legacy of ancient patterns and, while applying traditional craft, she is disclosing a new, graceful renaissance.