Rei Kawakubo's first Comme des Garçons show in Paris in April 1981 is now a legendary event in the history of fashion. Mounted unofficially at the Intercontinental Hotel during Prêt-à-Porter week and featuring just five models—she had not received the favour of the Chambre Syndicale de la Couture Parisienne, which decided, like the French Academy the century before, who would show during fashion week and who would not—Kawakubo made her debut alongside Yohji Yamamoto, her romantic partner at the time.
Kawakubo had begun Comme in 1969 after studying Aesthetics at Keio University and then working as a freelance fashion stylist. Comme the label started and held its first shows in Tokyo in 1975. In 1979 Kawakubo famously decided on a change of direction for the label (that is when real aficionados locate the turning point) and then the whole world changed in 1981.
The show with Yamamoto was not an immediate success. The first French fashion writers did not react positively to the clothes and the haute couture designers and powerful institutional figures who made up the Chambre Syndicale exhibited no great enthusiasm and certainly no immediate desire to make Kawakubo a member herself.
Rex Butler teaches Art History in the Faculty of Art Design and Architecture at Monash University.
