yesterday was another busy day in tokyo for me. travel + jetlag + standing for hours in cool-looking-but-painful shoes at the fair left me feeling like a pretzel – off to find a place for a massage! unfortunately, all the places on shokuan-dori in tokyo's little korea looked a bit sketchy, so i boarded the JR to shibuya where i know a few places. the tui-na place i normally go to doesn't open til 2:00 pm so i ended up in a shiatsu clinic place for a massage. it was at times both painful and relaxing but my day long headache was gone! i also had lunch at the raj mahal with gordon who does web design for amway japan and nissan [i hired gordon as a graphic designer when i was an art director for a small design studio in tokyo in 1988 and he's still here].
i then went to 100% to meet with michael young and his team and catch up on what he's showing and as usual, everything is amazing. his designer, ben walked the show with me and showed me his side projects. lots of great stuff in the main tents but the student work this year was really horrible – not one notable project that stood out [or am i burnt-out from seeing to many exhibitions this year?]. i also ran into ken o'rourke (the bicycle king of taichung) which was nice. he worked on the bikes michael young designed [see foto].
at tide i met the designers of a ridiculously expensive but wonderful line of kimonos called HIROCOLEDGE which debuts in the newly renovated Dairmaru across from Tokyo Station. Hiroko was as beautiful as her creations.
after tide we went to a party for a japanese laquerware maker called wajima where i met the chief technology office for a brand i LOVE calle amadana as well as catching up with designers from the shows. we then went to a party thrown by iDEA, a shop that does very well with nooka. i also met Chiaki Murata, an industrial designer whos work I also admire. It's really great to have the opportunity to meet so many people I admire in one city and on the same trip.
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