After years working as an apprentice geisha, Rei HIROSE started to work with kimonos and traditional Japanese tailoring. Within this field, she was saddened to hear that every year, a large number of kimonos are thrown away or mishandled at second-hand stores. She then started to collect these discarded kimonos and took up the challenge to upcycle them.

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In recent years, the environmental impact of the fashion industry has become a huge subject worldwide. The boom of fast-fashion created a system of “mass production, mass consumption and mass disposal”. According to a survey conducted in 2020 by the Ministry of Environment, the annual supply of new clothes in Japan (domestic production + import / export) represents 819 000 tons, from which 787 000 tons (90%) are thrown away by businesses or households after being used. 510 000 tons (64,8%) are estimated to be discarded. This represents approximately 130 large truckloads of household waste that are incinerated or landfilled every day. But the world is starting to change.

In January 2022, France enacted the world’s first “Clothing disposal ban”, which prohibits companies from discarding unsold new products. In Japan as well, the Consumer Affairs Agency launched in September 2021 a program called “Sustainable Fashion Supporter”, consisting of celebrities and experts working in collaboration with the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry and the Ministry of Environment. Now, every consumer needs to raise their awareness. Traditionally, Japanese kimonos were made by cutting and sewing straight strips of fabric together to avoid waste, and were passed down from parents to children, generation after generation, making them “sustainable” by essence. We must now return to that spirit.　(from Yahoo! Japan Documentary DOCS for SDGs)