It was my second season participating in a joint exhibition in Paris.
On the plane to Paris, I was seated on the window side of a three-seater, the middle seat was empty, and a woman of some elegance was seated on the aisle side. Two meals and two snacks were provided on the seven-hour flight to Paris. But I don't like snacking, so I didn't eat the snacks and decided to take them home with me.
I looked at her sideways and saw that she, like me, had put the snacks in her bag without eating them. I noticed this and thought casually that it was the same behavior as mine. We arrived at Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris without any conversation with the woman.

I saw that she was lost on the way to the baggage claim area, so I said to her for the first time, "Let's head there together, if you like. We arrived at the baggage claim area and parted without talking to each other.

As suitcases flowed one after another from the conveyor belt, my luggage rarely flowed smoothly, perhaps because it was a little larger than the standard conveyor belt in Paris, and my suitcase did not flow until the end.

As I was sitting alone in the spacious, deserted premises, I noticed that the woman was also sitting alone on the opposite side of the room, far away from me.
Yes, she, too, could not see her luggage.

She and I were seated next to each other, we happened to meet each other in the aisle, and even here, like myself, we had no luggage, I knew that I was destined to meet this woman, no matter how I thought about it, because such coincidences happened three times. Then I made up my mind and finally started talking to her.

I told her that I was a fashion designer in Tokyo, and she said, "I thought so.
I'm participating in a joint fashion exhibition in Paris starting tomorrow. I asked her, "I'd be happy to! I'd be delighted," she said.

A few moments later, an attendant appeared pushing a cart with my duralumin suitcase and her luggage (which, I later learned, included a big, gorgeous hat she was going to wear to a ball) on top of it. I handed her my business card, and she gave me hers with a Paris address on it, as if she lived in Paris.

I looked at her business card and saw that her last name was "Ozu. The first thing that comes to mind when I hear the name "Ozu" is that famous figure. I didn't think it was possible, but I thought I would ask her about it.
"You don't mean the famous Ozu, do you?" She replied, "Yes, that Ozu.

When I asked her about it, she told me that she was a relative of the film director Yasujiro Ozu. She is now living in Paris and used to be an actress when she was in Japan, and I believe she told me that she and actress Kazuko Yoshiyuki made their debut around the same time.

The next day, she showed up at the joint exhibition in Paris as promised and purchased a long red print skirt from FF's new collection.
It was more than 20 years ago, but that encounter is one of the most wonderful memories I have from my time in Paris.

At the time of the above episode, about two years had passed since we launched the brand, and it was the time when I realized how hard it was to run a company.
After the new collection samples are made and exhibited, the fabrics and accessories for the orders are purchased and sent to the mass production factory, and then the fabrics for the next season's samples are purchased again and the income from the mass production of the previous season's collection is received when the new collection samples are being made.
In other words, the income finally comes in after the two collection sample production costs and the mass production costs have been paid. I am sure that most designers have experienced the difficulties of running a company in this cycle, we are no exception, and I remember how difficult it was to make ends meet in the early days of my company. And I also thought to myself, "But, on the other hand, what if we could overcome this difficulty and become a brand that lasts for five years or something? Maybe then we could become a famous brand.

FERAL FLAIR is now in its 50th collection, and this year marks 25 years, almost a quarter of a century. It has been 25 years, not 5 years, but 25 years, and we have not become a famous brand at all!
Life doesn't always turn out the way we want it to, but on the other hand, we are still able to create, and for that, we are truly grateful.

The letter "Q" is the theme of this collection.
It means "Quarter Century" and "Q?" means "Question".
As long as we are continuing our creative activities, we want to continue to create clothes that contain questions, inquiries, and messages to society and to the world, as I have mentioned before, our strongest desire is to create clothes that are a beautiful fusion of different styles, elements, philosophies, and schools of thought.
We want to create clothes that can be accepted by all kinds of people: people who don't like elegance, who don't like casual wear, who are not confident in cutting-edge fashion, who are not interested in gothic styles, who only wear black, who never wear black, who have never worn prints, and people like that. We do not want to share a sense of camaraderie only with people of the same style as ourselves, but to show interest in and try to understand the values of different styles, and we want to put this attitude into our creations.
In other words, "clothes that transcend national borders and even religious differences, and that allow people with different ways of thinking and values to have a mutually acceptable relationship with each other.
I have always hoped to be able to create such dreamlike clothes.

Isshi KANAMARU 2025.3