Fruits

by Shoichi Aoki

This extensive collection of portraits represents a unique documentation of the changing face of street fashion throughout the last decade. Colourful, fascinating and funny, this is the first time... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0714840831
• Release Date: January 2001
• Publisher: Phaidon Press
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 1.95 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.0" x 0.8" x 6.8"

Customer Reviews

FRUiTS is such a yazz moment what 😭😭

Yup and yup and if you slayyyy

Selling Japanese Fruit to the World

I love the work by my fellow photographer Shoichi Aoki. Like me, he shoots the cool trendsetters on the streets of Tokyo. Since he started his magazine FRUITS in the mid-90s he has taken countless of photographs of the coolest street fashion that the world has seen sofar. The best of these shots are compiled in this book.Aoki first started documenting street fashion in London in the mid 80's. He has told me that he taught himself how to take photographs from books. At the time Japanese fashion wasn't free at all. Inspired by the free street fashion of London the young Aoki decided he wanted to do something about Japanese staleness. In the early to mid 90's things were beginning to change in Japan. The Harajuku area in Tokyo had its main thoroughfare closed off on Sundays and this was attracting more and more bands and show offs. The 'pedestrian heaven' (hokoten) as it was called became a laboratory and incubation center for new trends in music and fashion."In Japan," Aoki told me recently, "everybody had always dressed the same. Whatever was popular was worn by everyone. Everybody would wear Comme des Garçons or Ivy or whatever brand was 'in'. But suddenly Harajuku became free. People started to feel that it was cool to coordinate your own clothes. Harajuku fashion became really interesting and fun." He recalls: "You had this small group of trendsetters, perhaps 10 to 20 people. Whenever they came up with something new, others would soon imitate them. But these imitators weren't as cool as the original trendsetters so the trendsetters didn't want to be identified with them.""To differentiate themselves again they came up with new things. It just escalated. They kept on trying to escape from their imitators right into "decora" (fashion style sporting lots of decorative stuff and strong bright colors). They figured nobody would follow them into wearing clothes that crazy."FRUITS shows these 'crazy' trends in all their details. The book has virtually no text, just page after page of exquisitely printed color photographs. Aoki's photographs are unique in that he shows the full body, from head to toe, in actual street situations. This is much better than shots done in the studio. It is like photographing animals in the wild opposed to photographing them in the zoo.Full body shots makes it possible to not only see the pants, skirts, dresses, coats and sweaters, but also the shoes, socks, stockings, hats and wild hairdos in all their glory.Short descriptions explain what each person is wearing, their age and their 'obsession'.If you want to put to rest the myth that Japanese people are not creative and original, you just have got to read this book. You'll find it a great inspiration.

Talk about goofy!

This is a hard book to put down! The clothing worn by the young Japanese hipsters in this book are costumey, outrageous, theatrical and over-the-top...and the kids all look like they're having a heck of a lot of fun with what they wear. There are little points of inspiration in the pages of this book that I want to borrow for myself - adding an unexpected and totally off-the-wall accessory, wearing a normally taboo color combo, or mixing patterns. While I am a bit older than the pink-haired punks and Elegant Gothic Lolitas found on the glossy pages, I think the message here isn't one of age, or even geographic location. It's that fashion is something we often take too seriously, and there is plenty of room for self-expression and fun in this area of our day-to-day lives. Even if you may not be ready to go out wearing 8 Hello Kitty barrettes, 6-inch white platform wedgies, a pink vinyl Barbie purse and chartreuse dreadlocks with your black power suit, you can still have a lot of fun checking out the wild children in this beautiful book.

Dizzying array of Japanese eye candy!

This brilliant book isn't fancy fashion photography--it's a series of slides that are made purposely for documentation. The subjects are clearly lit, always centred in the frame. Each page has a little bit of text in the corners--the model's name and age (13 to 25 seems to be the range here), favorite fashion, and "current obsession". Some of the answers to these bare-bones questions are amusing, but the focus and attraction of this book is outlandish streetwear.And what streetwear! Camden town isn't a tenth as inventive. A dizzying array of styles and colours from head to feet; a mixture of cultures--a Japanese skinhead in suede cowboy chaps; kimonos worn with monster-fur boots; a bevy of little girls who are living dolls; an unintentionally ironic set of identically-dressed "punks"--every page is different from the rest. If you're the least bit interested in costuming and contemporary fashion, BUY THIS BOOK NOW! What a delight and inspiration!

Kawaii!!!

This book is a launch pad for creative dressing. Page after page of people playing almost every type of character from being the hippy to being the gothic lolita. After looking through this book, I have finally started making my own clothes. My favourite character was the person whose "fashion point" was to dress like a "suspicious looking woman". This is FUN! This made me realize that I should dress more like the weirdo that I am. This book has connected me towards my inner being. haha.

Yummy, colorful, and enduring Eye Candy!

I bought this book the moment it was released, based upon the cover photo which I saw in a magazine. This book is really fun-- if you like colors, can appreciate a whacky sense of fashion, and the extremeness of this particular collection. What I did not bargain for were the catchy captions for each subject: i.e."What is your point of fashion?" and "What is your latest obsession?" Some of the subject's replies' were great, especially the guy whose latest obsession was "digging holes". In addition to the interesting poses, photography, and creativity, the captions make this book fun to have, fun to pass around...and I am extremely happy that I found this piece of bound eye candy!