Tokyo Show for NYC Fashion Watchers: A-POC ABLE ISSEY MIYAKE's Antarctic Jeans With JAXA

A special exhibition, "The Possibility of a Piece of Cloth: TYPE-XVII JAXA project by A-POC ABLE ISSEY MIYAKE," opened October 21 at 21_21 DESIGN SIGHT Gallery 3 in Tokyo's Midtown Garden, Akasaka. It runs through November 19 and is closed on Tuesdays. The show is organized by Issey Miyake Inc. It is a Tokyo presentation, but one that should interest New Yorkers who follow Japanese design and fashion.

The starting point is imagery of Antarctica captured by JAXA's climate-observation satellite SHIKISAI (GCOM-C). The ice sheet averages roughly two kilometers in thickness, and the cracks running through it reveal deep navy ocean beneath. A-POC ABLE ISSEY MIYAKE turned that image into jeans using advanced jacquard weaving, rendering the pattern through variations in weave density to create tone and gradation while keeping the texture of denim.

The exhibition also shows prototype fabrics inspired by the same imagery. Developed with the laboratory of Tomohiro Tachi at the University of Tokyo, which studies the geometry and structure of origami, the work explores what happens when cloth is given a new structure. The team sees uses beyond clothing, including interior and building materials, and imagines environments such as space and polar regions, where limited materials and constraints become conditions for creativity.

Together, the jeans and the prototypes ask what an Earth-observing viewpoint can offer the relationship between body and clothing, and extend Issey Miyake's idea of a single piece of cloth to new settings. The show aims to prompt visitors to think about garments that respond to environmental and social questions.