Abstract
Globalizing the Japanese fashion successfully, Hanae Mori's work awoke the western fashion world's nostalgia towards the East. Analyzing the aesthetic characteristics of Hanae Mori's clothes what kinds of aesthetic characteristic that her work had and what kinds of influences that she made in the modern fashion would provide substantial contribution of the world's modern fashion. This study provided forms and remarkable features of Japanese traditional custom, revealed Hanae Mori's life and her philosophies of fashion, and defined Hanae Mori's aesthetic characteristics by analyzing her work from 1970's until the retirement, July 2004. Methods of this study are completed by documentary records of Hanae Mori, research papers and fashion magazines that are published domestically and internationally, and collected materials from internet. The results of analysis are epitomized as below. Hanae Mori was the first Japanese fashion designer who expressed the characteristics of traditional Japanese custom with modernity sprit. In the 60's and 70's, especially in the U.S. and European fashion market, she inspired western fashion designers by her original sprit of art: combining Japanese tradition which showed distinctive color and spirit of nature and the western beauty. Hanae Mori created new dress molding from the Kimono's unstructured feature. Her layered look dressing, oblique adjustment and Obi, and others all enabled Mori to express Japanese image into modern fashion. Additionally, in terms of traditional Japanese image being acknowledged world-widely, she played a major contribution in world fashion by suggesting a new vision and raised several sensations in fashion artistry and modeling. Amongst her various patterns, Hanae Mori had butterfly patterns in most of her works, which was her representative symbol. This spoke for her strong will and senses of duty that wanting to inform beauty of Japanese women who were reflected in modern and graceful butterfly patterns. Flowers were another element that symbolized Mori. Using various flower motifs that bloomed in every different four seasons, she connected two images into her fashion; beauty of the nature and enlightening image of vibrating life. The aesthetic characteristics of Hanae Mori's clothes were defined as five: Japonism, naturalism, feminism, eroticism, and modernism. Japonism which is the spirit of Japanese, Mori used the concept to connect the East and the West. Naturalism represented harmony of the nature and the human. Feminism highlighted Eastern women's beauty. Eroticism emitted feminine attraction. Modernism represented simplicity and sophistication. Such aesthetic character illustrated Mori's original emotion that was based on Japanese spirit and she combined it with values of the East and the West. From the analysis of Mori's aesthetic characteristics, it is clearly recognizable her feministic beauty is emanated by her original emotion and sensibility.
