Questioning The Concept of A Uniform: The women's hand made uniforms

Yukari

Ayaka, Yukari and Asuna, outside during the opening event.

Yukari brought in a fabric that was very meaningful to her;

she had carried her daughter in this textile when she was a baby.

Yukari wanted to integrate this fabric into her uniform.

She had already decided that she wanted to explore working with a traditional
Japanese embroidery technique, Sashiko, a very old form of hand sewing using
simple running stitches. The Japanese word Sashiko means ‘little stabs’
and has been considered as functional embroidery or a form of decorative
reinforcement stitching to repair points of wear or tears with patches.

Yukari cut flowers from the fabric and used Sashiko stitches

to apply the fragments to the collar of her uniform.

Yukari decorated the cuffs of her sleeves and the bottom of her dress with a decorative form of Sashiko.

I encouraged Yukari to be spontaneous with her stitching, it was important

to her though to make regular traditional stitching patterns.

Instead of wearing a static uniform, it is Yukari’s intention to continue

evolving her uniform until it is completely decorated by the end of the exhibition.

Ayaka had brought up in our conversations around their current uniform, that she felt self conscious about wearing heels in the museum galleries. As part of the rules pertaining to wearing their uniforms, the women are required to wear a minimum of 5 cm high heels. Ayaka is uncomfortable with the sound of the heels on the galery floor alerting visitors to their presence. Yukari in het initial ideas and sketches for their new uniform proposed Jika Tabi shoes, a traditional Japanese shoe for workers in applied occupations, from construction workers to people who work in the rice-fields. The women were inspired by her suggestion and three of the women choose to wear Jika Tabi shoes with their uniform.

Yukari cut the back pocket on her uniform from a jean skirt that her daughter no longer wears.

Mio

With the first series of design drawings Mio created beautiful embroidery samples, to become a decorative element on different places of her uniform.

In preparation for the workshop, I had asked Art Tower Mito to buy 2 kinds of fabric, white cotton that we could use to make a first prototype and 10 yards of the fabric that resembles the material their every day uniform is made of. I hadn’t anticipated that the women would want to make a completely new uniform, somehow I had imagined that within the time frame and the women’s comfort level we would make adjustments to their current uniform. When the women decided to make a completely new form, we had these 2 fabrics available next to the fabrics they brought from clothing they no longer wear but have an emotional connection to.

For the second round of designs Mio proposed a design that integrated both fabrics in an alternating block pattern.

Mio created a feminine version of a waistcoat to wear over her uniform in which she could integrate a variety of pockets; pockets are an essential part of their uniform, since the ATM faces have to carry pens, their mobile phones, a notebook and a flashlight among other things.

Mio included elements into her uniform that are invisible to the spectator; these elements are very personal and make her feel more intimately connected to her uniform.

She created an inside pocket for her waist coat that carries the memory of the dog that she grew up with but that passed away not so long ago. She both drew and embroidered the dog onto the fabric.

Mio used Aki's fabric to finish the seams and edges of her uniform.

At the indigo dye workshop Mio created a striped pattern

She used the indigo fabic she created to add a decorative element on the shoulder part of her waistcoat.

The tower and the logo of of Art Tower Mito

The tower of Art Tower Mito is a 100 meter tall tower that is composed of traingles that spiral to the top. The logo of Art Tower Mito includes three circles colored yellow, blue and red.

Both the tower and the logo inspired great designs for the women's new uniforms.

Aki

Aki’s inspiration was an artist that worked with mime, and she brought in other images that reminded of circus. She choose circus as the inspiration for her uniform,

A string with triangular flags often associated with circus was the inspiration for the neckline. The breast pocket she created is an image of a circus tent, up-side-down,

and the little thread balls (Temari) remind of clowns.

Next to beautiful uniform designs Aki created embroidery and crochet samples. These samples found their way into her uniform in different parts and in different ways.

Aki paid a lot of attention to detail, and allowed playful suggestions to inform the design of her uniform.

Aki attended a college where she learned traditional Japanese dyeing techniques.
She brought in beautiful fabrics that she had dyed herself as part of a class assignment
but her teacher didn’t accept them as being perfect enough. The women
in the workshop loved the fabrics and some used it in their own uniforms.

The tower of Art Tower Mito inspired the belt that Aki created for her uniform.
She integrated many of the fabrics she had designed in college.

Aki treated 'mistakes' she made along the way as design oportunities.

This sleeve was sewn inside out; she made 2 colorful ribbons to tape the edges of the seam.

Aya

The first day Aya had shared the story of her car being broken in and all her precious

belongings taken. The sweater she was wearing that day represented an important lesson;

never to leave important belongings in her car.

Aya brought the fabric of the chair covers that she had made. She loves this fabric

and has already used the same fabric four times to make new chair covers.
Inspired by my stories of vintage fabrics that I use to make my clothes,

she decided to bring in the chair covers that had covered the chairs of her car

the day her car was broken into. They are faded and show signs of wear;

Aya used this fabric in her new uniform.

Aya is an origami master, she teaches origami classes. Aya has a strong connection to traditional Japanese culture, which was evident in many of her choices and actions. Every day she would bring a special tea to share with the participants of the workshop. Aya loves tea and knows much about it, Darjeeling is her favorite tea and she made us taste and experience

its special fragrance and delicate composition.

For her uniform Aya has folded flowers covered in the fabric that covered her car chairs and she made jewelry that is inspired by the tower of Art Tower Mito.

Aya also loves snow flakes, when it snows and a snow flake lands on her arm, she instantly analyzes its structure and translates it into paper cuttings.

Aya used the paper cuttings of snowflakes as stencils to decorate the edge of her underskirt.

Aya choose the dark blue woolen fabric as the main fabric for her new uniform. She didn’t want to stand out too much; the dark blue wool resembles the fabric their daily uniform is made of. When Aya realized that most other women in the group used the white fabric

as their main material, she added some elements to balance her uniform with their's.

These are a pair of sleeves to be worn underneath the sleeves of the uniform, the edges are trimmed with ruffled cuffs made out of the seat cover material.

During the indigo dye workshop, we experimented with Shibori dye techniques.

Aya bound and stitched her fabric in such a way

resisting the dye to form the image of a snow flake.

A day in Tokyo

After the first week, I spent one day in Tokyo. Together with Nakako, we visisted a vintage kimono and textile shop that Mizuki had recommended. Nakako and I selected fabrics as a present for the women. We selected 'shocking pink' silk for Mayumi and neon yellow for Ayaka. Aya loved the ikat silk fabric with plum blossoms.

Mayumi

The first day we met, Mayumi brought 2 uniforms that she loves, a bright green one and a bright pink one. Both uniforms represented earlier jobs or functions she had performed. Everybody responded to the pink uniform and Mizuki tried it on. We as a group concluded that Mayumi loves ‘shocking pink’. Pink became the theme for her new uniform.

Mayumi was inspired by workshops in the museum,
which included collaborative making processes.
Together with her son, Mayumi drew the first designs
for accessories to adorn her uniform. The one above shows
the tower of Art Tower Mito as an inspiration.

Mayumi loves making accessories, the first day we met,
she gave me a beautiful pin with roses as a present.

For her uniform she was inspired by Asuna who started painting on fabric quite

early in the process. After Asuna had cut the sleeve pattern out of the fabric,

she offered the remainder to the participants in the workshop.

Mayumi was excited and used Asuna’s fabric as an extension of her collar.

Inspired by Asuna’s painting, both Ayaka and Mayumi created paintings

on fabric to use in their uniforms.

At the day before the opening Mayumi shared with her colleagues that

she would continue to work on her uniform until it was all covered in pink.

The smallest and cutest pocket ever, for small coins Mayumi explained to me : ).

Ayaka

Ayaka, like most of the women had no sewing experience at all when we started the workshop. But she had very strong ideas and advanced her work in a silent yet determined way.

For her collar she used the fabric of a cherished black hoody that

she took apart and she used the neon yellow obi fabric

Nakako and I had selected for her in Tokyo.

Ayaka wanted her uniform to be short and have an a-symetrical seam line.

Ayaka's drawings of the sky.

Inspired by Asuna’s painted fabric, Ayaka experimented with painting fabrics as well. One of her inspirations are the water lilies from Monet. She used a blue fabric ink pen to copy her thesis paper on Monet onto the fabric. The hand-written letters I had sent the women in preparation of the workshop, inspired the color of the blue ink.

Ayaka was playful and experimental, combining different binding techniques
in her indigo dye piece which resulted in a beautiful pattern.

Ayaka had a very specific silhouette in mind. Following Ayaka’s instructions,

Toshiko-san, Zoe, Eri and I pinned the hemline and

added the painted fabric to complete her vision.

Meme

The logo of Art Tower Mito has 3 circles in primary colors;

Meme used the circles to create beautiful

earrings to combine with her uniform.

Meme loves vintage clothing and next to her job as a face at Art Tower Mito,

she works in a second hand clothing shop. Over the years she has collected textiles and garments with prints that she loves. She loves bold prints and clothing that stands out.

At first Meme found it challenging to combine her different identities into her new uniform; her identity as a face for ATM and her identity as a fashion loving person. Since she is one of the younger guards, at work she wants to be taken seriously by her colleagues, in her life outside of work she dresses with a strong sense of style and she likes to stand out.

Meme had a lot of great design ideas. She wanted her uniform to be adaptable, the inside collar is attached with snap buttons to the outside collar so that Meme can change it. The skirt is a separate piece to be worn over the white dress.

For her uniform she choose 3 pieces that she combined to make a skirt and the collar of her uniform. The collar is made of a vintage obi, and the skirt is made of 2 shirts from the 70’s. Meme took the shirts apart with a seam ripper, and we placed the pattern pieces of the skirt on the separate pieces of fabric.