This season Babylon returns to CUBE Showroom, for Paris Fashion Week SS18, bringing exclusive new Japanese brand designs from Tokyo and Osaka. This June, we have refined our selection even further, and are excited to show the latest from only our top two picks: T.A.S. and AF Artefact.
AF Artefact will show their newest Men’s and Women’s lines. following on from their debut line of Womenswear last season. T.A.S. will present their latest selection of hand-crafted leather accessories and lifestyle products. See below for brand bios and info.
Buyer appointments and visits available for booking now.
T.A.S. is designed in Tokyo by Tetsuya Ando. Born in 1979, Ando worked as Chief Production Manager at Julius _7 2004-2011, before creating T.A.S in 2011. T.A.S’s debut collection launched Spring/ Summer 2012 in Tokyo with an exhibition and runway show following in Berlin Fashion Week S/S 2012. The origin of the brand name T.A.S comes from the computer coding command, TEST AND SET, in which a process is coded to produce an outcome without fail.
T.A.S. designs embody a multifaceted world, while working within a strict minimalist framework. They combine European design with traditional Japanese techniques, with a specific focus on exploring and experimenting with new qualities and applications of leather. Forms are deconstructed and reconfigured, to pursue a powerful, serene and singular sense of structure.
Rather than seeing the frame of fashion as containing only clothes, bags and hats, T.A.S. proposes to consider all lifestyle elements including room fragrances, umbrellas, ashtrays, etc. Therefore, although they will announce products according to collection time, they do not produce clothing. To express the brand’s conceptual vision, every season T.A.S. proposes a total space, including music, photographs and works.
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AF Artefact is designed in Osaka by Designer Yoshiki Takatsuka. Takatsuka graduated from Osaka Bunka Fashion College, after which he worked for an apparel manufacturer, developing his skills and experience in design, patterning, fabrication, etc. In 2009 he moved on to establish his own apparel manufacturing label, originally as A.F HOMME. In A/W2016 the brand made its debut at Paris fashion week, at which time the label was renamed A.F ARTEFACT, and AF design and construction transitioned into a new arena of fashion production and presentation.
From A/W2017 AF Artefact is showing both menswear and womenswear lines. The pieces designed by Takatsuka aim to complement and emphasise the individuality of the wearer, without compromising the elements of individuality that come with comfort in oneself and one’s attire. The AF clothing style plays with minimal, oversized, and unisex aesthetics, and incorporates a range of material and formal techniques to achieve a balance between on comfort, ease, wearability on one hand, and individuality, distinction, personal expression on the other. They interpret the structure of body to mold its image into a longer, slimmer form, so clothing becomes a tool to enhance the human form, attitude, and even experience.
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