Date: born 1969

Biography: Jun Takahashi, creator of the cutting-edge label Undercover, has been called “the essence of Japanese cool” and “a powerful new fashion force.” He once described his designs as “cute but scary, beautiful but ugly.” Certainly, he sometimes explores the dark side of fashion in a way that is both disturbing and romantic. Following in a line of Japanese avant-garde designers, Takahashi’s designs transcend classic notions of beauty. “Life is beauty, but it’s pain as well,” he has remarked. Takahashi (1969– ) attended Tokyo’s Bunka Fashion College where he divided his time between studying and singing for a punk rock band called the Tokyo Sex Pistols. While a student, he launched his own fashion label, Under Cover (later spelled Undercover) and sold his punk-inspired designs to small boutiques. In 1993 Takahashi opened Nowhere, his first retail shop, in Harajuku, with his friend Nigo (founder of the label A Bathing Ape). The following year, he showed his first Under Cover collection in Tokyo, and opened his first Under Cover shop in 1998. Takahashi won the support of veteran designer Rei Kawakubo early in his career, and it was Kawakubo who encouraged him to show in Paris in 2002. Takahashi’s Paris debut collection, entitled “Scab,” featured garments violently deconstructed—torn, shredded, and reassembled using haphazard red stitching. The inspirations for Takahashi’s collections have varied greatly from season to season, but it is his perverse logic that unifies his work. His paradoxical world is filled with unsettling imagery. Buttons resemble eyeballs, dresses can sprout tendrils of hair, and what first appear to be flowers are actually skulls. For spring 2004 Takahashi’s models appeared as identical twins, one a “visual meltdown” of the other. Although he has received numerous awards, Takahashi says, “I’m never satisfied with my work. I always have the desire to make something new, something wearable, something strong.”