Ametora" was born out of the Japanese obsession with the "real thing.

　

Growing up in a college town in Florida, the son of a college professor, American traditional was not a "style," much less a "fashion" for a young boy. It was a commonplace attire that did not deserve to be called "style," much less "fashion. Last fall, he published a book titled "AMETORA. The subtitle of the book is "How Japan Saved American Style.

W. David Marks, a student in the Oriental Department at Harvard University, was baptized in fashion in Tokyo , where he was staying for an internship.

Until then, I had never doubted that America was the coolest country in the world. . But when I came to Japan, I was shocked to find out that this was not the case. I realized that the people I met in Japan were generally fashionable and way ahead of their American counterparts.

. and a shocking encounter with that "monkey". He loved Japanese indie music and discovered the coolest T-shirt in a music magazine.

. I was so excited that I looked like Cornelius in Planet of the Apes. I had no idea that T-shirts could be "fashion" or that they could be "rare" until I came to Japan. I had no idea that T-shirts could be "fashion" or that they could be "rare" before I came to Japan. I was surprised to find out that there was a whole world of fashion here in Japan that I had never even heard of.

He later returned to Harvard University , where he wrote his thesis on the theme of "the back fields. Then, shortly before the Lehman Brothers collapse, David decided to compile the history of Japanese youth culture into a book.

. But time went by without me finding a core point of view. In the meantime, "Take IVy" was published in the U.S., and it quickly became a hot topic. Around the same time, through the acquaintance of a friend who used to work at Van Djaket, I had the opportunity to meet Shosuke Ishizu, the son of Kensuke Ishizu, the founder of Van Djaket and his right-hand man. He taught me so many things. From the history of jeans to the culture of the backstage area. It was the moment when the path to writing "Ametora" was paved in my mind.

David's approach to "American Tigers" is quite different from the "geeky how-to" and "insider's knowledge" of style and detail that is common in men's fashion. . "Unraveling the true history of the American Tiger" is what he has set out to do in this book.

From the westernization of the early Meiji era to the emergence of the "Miyuki tribe," the foundation of men's fashion magazines "Men's Club" and "Popeye" in the '60s, musicians and cultural icons, Yokosuka delinquents and the biker gang style of the '80s, Shibukajis and the Ura Hara Movement. ....... From a cultural perspective based on meticulous research, the book carefully unravels how American traditional, a style he had never paid attention to, was brought to Japan and evolved in its own unique way. It is a magnificent story of the birth of "American traditional" that we Japanese do not know.

　

. I am interested in closing as a social phenomenon. . I'm more interested in the story of why the Japanese are so obsessed with the detail of selvedge, rather than selvedge as a design element.

Ivy in Japan was only a movement by consumers, not a style tied to a certain university, as it should have been. It was one of the layers of fashion. . But I think that is an important theme in the history of Japanese fashion.

Since the AMETRA was not originally Japanese, it was an "artificially" imported culture, rather than a style that was organically nurtured in the Japanese climate. Subsequently, the obsession with the "real thing" led to its own evolution, and eventually, the Japanese AMETRA surpassed the original. Americans are wearing the Japanese version of the American Tiger!"

　

The same is true for jeans. Until now, various Japanese brands and designers have repeatedly innovated and tried to make Levi's 501, which is considered to be the ideal form of jeans, more "like the original. Some of them even faithfully reproduced the number of stitches. Some people may say that this is "just imitation and not creativity," but that's just the process. What is undeniable is the fact that the finished Japanese jeans are far superior to the originals.

I expected the subtitle, "Japan Saved American Style," to be controversial, but now it is "universally recognized" that Japanese denim is the best in the world and that Japanese Ivy style is more authentic than the original. I myself was very surprised by this.

Now that the Japanese translation of the book is about to be published, David is about to begin work on his next book on the theme of "cultural transitions and authenticity," which is a further development of the observations he made in this book.

. Finally, he offered an interesting theory about the innovations that Japan has achieved with the American brand and jeans.

In the U.S. , it is believed that things always evolve looking forward. In Japan, on the other hand, there is a deep-seated longing for the "ideals of the past" that the modern world has lost, and there is a spirit of looking back to the past in an attempt to innovate. I believe that the spirit of trying to approach the ideals of the past is the philosophy with which the Japanese view things.