![Coca-Cola x HUMAN MADE Collection]( "Coca-Cola x HUMAN MADE Collection")
Taking inspiration from vintage Coca-Cola vendor wear, Japanese designer NIGO® is today unveiling a new line of menswear that reinterprets iconic work wear from the early 20th century. NIGO®, famed street culture purveyor and former A Bathing Ape creator, is launching the collection with Japan’s most iconic boutique, Beams, under his newest label, Human Made – the successor to his highly sought after Ape collection.
The Coca-Cola x Human Made x Beams line is inspired by research that NIGO® has conducted around 20th century era industrial wear fashions, and reconstructs what “might have been” a look of the time in a modern day context. Uniquely, some pieces have taken on even more personal value for NIGO®, as the designer has pulled from his own bespoke collection of Coca-Cola memorabilia, reinterpreting some of these looks for his new line. NIGO® says of the collection: “I have been wearing Coca-Cola since back in high school – be it vintage T’s or my retro red Coke leather jacket, which is one of my most prized possessions. I was also the Japan Coca-Cola yo-yo champion back in the ’80s, so this collaboration was a long time coming!”
Items that feature in the collection include a shop coat, cover all jacket, a work shirt, cap, jodhpur shorts, a sweatshirt, and four t-shirts. All items will maintain some of the details of a much loved garment, soft to the hand from many wears and washings. Brushed and weathered treatments, plus stitching true to the 1900s era, will make for truly unique and authentic pieces.
Icons such as the Coca-Cola logo from the 1910s will be reissued on items such as the shop coat. The cover all jacket will feature a chinstrap and watch pocket common to jackets of the early 1900s and will maintain the same artisan stitching as the shop coat. Other items such as the work shirt will feature asymmetric pockets, and the cotton sweat shirt will be created on a machine rarely used in today’s design world, the loop wheel – a vintage cotton knitting machine dating back to the ’30s and ’40s.
It has been two years since the first collaboration between Beams and Coca-Cola
took place in 2011 to honor the iconic brand’s 125th birthday. Beams’ role in this new project has been to bring NIGO®, Human Made and Coca-Cola together to create these new classic apparel items. Beams will also be unveiling new artwork to support the campaign, featuring shots of Beams’ CEO, Mr. Shitara modeling the new pieces, as well as NIGO® himself.
Anachronorm’s Spring/Summer 2013 collection looks mad comfy and relaxed. Even though there is an element of smartness to several of the looks, the three-piece suiting lacks rigidity and sits happily alongside the more casual pieces like baggy jeans, shorts, deconstructed jackets and painter’s overalls (pre-soiled, Margiela style). Continuing to push forward with an American vintage style, designer Tomoki Tanushi’s eye for detail maintains an authentic feel for the collection and brand as a whole.
