“All the boys and girls become their own stylist,” Bizel explained. And since living quarters are generally too small for much decorating or entertaining, you get a lot of teens and 20-somethings who decorate … themselves. For the most part, the only time people can express themselves through fashion is the period between school and office life-roughly ages 15 to 25. School-age kids and office workers wear uniforms (rush hour on the subway looks like one giant business suit).
Here’s how Bizel explains the Tokyo street fashion phenomenon: Most Japanese don’t have choices when it comes to clothing. “They used to go to Paris or London,” he said, “but they realize Japan is the best place for fresh ideas.” His clients include companies such as Coach, Esprit, Quicksilver, Timberland and H&M-they all want to know what the small Japanese boutiques are doing. They don’t want the Gap, where everyone looks the same at the end of the day.” Bizel, a Frenchman who arrived on the scene a decade ago, started his consulting business in 2001. “They are their own fashion designers, and they look for little details to set themselves apart. “People like to create their own style,” Bizel said, as we sat down and he lit up a cigarette. We walked through the stores and parked ourselves at a coffee shop. “They’re all here.” He pointed across the street to Laforet (a collection of trendy Japanese boutiques that cater to 18-to 24-year-olds. “See, the Gap is empty,” said Bizel, as he walked up to me, shaking my hand. I saw purple glitter stilettos with khaki cargo shorts, ripped jeans with four-inch platform shoes, the grunge look combined with Little House on the Prairie sweetness, the schoolgirl look on girls long out of school, vintage sportswear, berets next to top hats and everything so helter-skelter and fabulous that there seemed to be no rhyme or reason to the getups. I eyed a woman wearing tight jeans under a flowing skirt with yellow sneakers and a guy in camouflage pants, a brown velvet blazer and pink Chuck Taylors. But the fashion show in front of the store was worth the price of admission. Still, the next day I went to Harajuku and sat on the steps of the three-floor chain that hogged what must be one of the world’s most desirable-and expensive-pieces of commercial real estate. “Meet me tomorrow at the corner of Omotesando and Meiji streets, in front of the Gap,” he told me over the phone. This was one guy who I wanted to meet, and I hoped that he’d have time to take me to a boutique so hip and underground that it hadn’t yet been discovered by local fashion gurus.
The nine-hour, $600–$700 private tour covers Tokyo’s trendiest shops, blocks, styles, concepts and products. In fact, Tokyo is so hot when it comes to reinterpreting global fashion that if you are an American or European retailer, hiring fashion consultant Loic Bizel to take you on the Tokyo Fashion Tour (is a no-brainer. So I figured see-through umbrellas were just this city’s über-hip answer to foul weather, and I imagined that before long, I’d be one of the cool kids. Japanese influences are found worldwide, in music videos, movies and video games, and on the catwalk. I didn’t know much about this Japanese city of 12 million, but I knew I was headed to a place on the cutting edge of cool, where pop culture is served up as universally as white rice and green tea. So, on my long eastbound flight, I made my Tokyo to-do list: Watch sumo go to a tuna auction buy umbrella. I’d hunted around for them in Washington only to find pint-sized versions that barely covered my head, and were covered with ladybugs. You know the one: clear, plastic and toted around by the always-cool Scarlett Johansson in the film Lost in Translation. I was headed to Tokyo, and I wanted Charlotte’s umbrella. Shopping in Tokyo, where street corners double as catwalks and the daring flaunt their color-clasing individuality in a kind of live theater, is not for the fainthearted.
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