In my twenties, I didn't even have time to watch my own children grow up.

Yamashita: I was drawn to Tokyo because I believed that if I came here and looked around, I would surely find something, and I wanted to get information from the staff of clothing stores, and all of those things combined made me yearn for Tokyo. After graduating from a fashion design school, I became a stylist's assistant, but as time went on, I became more drawn to the charm of American-made individual pieces than to creating outfits, so I quit my assistant job, went for an interview at Propeller, and joined as a part-time employee.
After that, there were a lot of twists and turns, and I was incredibly busy from the age of 20 to 30.

One day, I had a day with no plans, so I searched for "Mojito" on the Japan Patent Office's website and found that no one had registered the trademark needed to launch a fashion brand.
That's how I started my own brand of mojitos.

Shibata (bursts out laughing): What?! It pretty much started on a whim, didn't it? (laughs)
Well, even if we interpret that as inspiration, why did you focus so much on Hemingway?


I mentioned that the origin of Yamashita 's men's clothing lies in "uniforms," but the more I learn about clothes, the more I find myself returning to two issues of "Popeye."
American Basic has always been good at derivatives, but the original source is here. So when we started Mojito, we focused on the worldview of Ernest Hemingway.

Hemingway was intellectual, loved traveling and fishing, drank alcohol, was married four times, won the Nobel Prize in Literature, and was good at sports. He was an easy character to emulate in men's fashion.
Furthermore, although Hemingway was American, he moved to Paris after World War I, and his personality was shaped to some extent in France, so he incorporates Parisian culture and fashion into Mojito's clothing.

Shibata : I see... In a sense, by using icons, you've created room for interpretation, avoiding a style that's overly focused on historical accuracy.
Hmm, that's impressive! The more I listen, the deeper it seems.

Page 3: What kind of clothes will I create in the future?