HARAJUKU

The Harajuku district, near Tokyo's Meiji Shrine, becomes a gathering point for Japanese youth fashion from the 1980s on, gaining even more force through the 1990s and 2000s as one of the world's centers of street style.

Starting in 1988, DJ and designer Hiroshi Fujiwara helps shape the "Ura-Harajuku" scene (the backstreets behind the main avenue), mixing hip-hop influence imported from the US with Japanese design sensibility — the seed of Japanese streetwear that would go on to become global.

Harajuku works as the opposite of traditional Japanese social conformity: a space where fashion is radical personal invention, with no fixed uniform and no single aesthetic rule — the goal is to never repeat yourself.

Starting in 1997, photographer Shoichi Aoki's magazine FRUiTS documents these looks directly on the street and carries them to the world in translation, becoming an international reference for street style photography.

Under the "Harajuku" umbrella live several distinct styles — Lolita (Victorian/Rococo-inspired), decora (maximal accessory layering), gyaru, and others — all mixing high fashion, vintage clothing, handmade pieces, and accessories in unexpected ways.

In parallel, the Japanese streetwear that would become a world reference is born there: Nigo founds A Bathing Ape (BAPE) in 1993, and Jun Takahashi founds Undercover in 1994, both straight out of the Ura-Harajuku backstreets.

FRUiTS helped launch the street style photography genre that later spread worldwide, decades before fashion blogs.

The mix of hip-hop and Japanese design sensibility created in Ura-Harajuku gave rise to Japanese streetwear brands with global reach and influence today.