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| The brilliant hues of the new Issey Miyake IM Men collection at the Cartier Foundation in Paris. Photograph (above) by Jay Zoo for DAM. |
Under the scorching summer sun in Paris, Issey Miyake’s IM Men
returned to the runway with Dancing Texture, a Spring/Summer 2026
collection inspired by Japanese ceramicist Shoji Kamoda. The show transformed fabric into sculpture, channeling bold forms into designs that shimmered, swirled, and
unfolded in motion. With a new ASICS footwear collaboration and a design team
pushing boundaries, the collection marked a powerful fusion of tradition,
technology, and transformation. Story by Jeanne-Marie Cilento. Photographs by Jay Zoo and Andrea Heinsohn
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The fabrics recalling the ceramicist Shoji Kamoda, were key to the new collection shown in Paris. Photograph: Andrea Heinsohn
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ON a steaming summer morning in Paris, Issey Miyake’s IM Men's collection was presented at the Cartier Foundation, heat radiating from the contemporary art museum's steel and glass. Yet the fashion offered a bracing dash of cool minimalism, a meditation on form, motion,
and material memory.
For Spring/Summer 2026, the Japanese house stepped into new terrain
by looking to an old master: pioneering Japanese ceramicist Shoji Kamoda
(1933–1983), whose short but radical career transformed the very language of
clay. Now, his quiet revolution finds a second life, this time, not on the
wheel, but on the body.
Kamoda, trained in Kyoto and active in Mashiko and Töno, was
known for challenging the boundaries of ceramic form and texture. Through bold
glazes, engraved surfaces, and sculptural shapes, he rejected the purely
functional in favor of pieces that seemed to hum with inner movement. IM Men,
the last line personally envisioned by Issey Miyake,
takes that same spirit of experimentation and applies it to cloth. The result
is Dancing Texture, a kinetic menswear collection that interprets Kamoda’s
essence not as reference, but as transformation.
The show was an audacious, cerebral continuation of Issey Miyake’s vision ~ not simply designed, but engineered, often with humour, intelligence, and occasionally delightful excess
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The performance part of the show added another layer of meaning to the collection, with the dancers wearing the textiles inspired by Kamoda's pottery. Photograph: Jay Zoo
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With the guidance of design trio Sen Kawahara, Yuki
Itakura, and Nobutaka Kobayashi, the collection unfolded as a dialogue between
art and garment. The runway, bathed in the intense light, played host to a
series of pieces that shifted, shimmered, and unfolded.
Dramatic choreography animated the designs in ways that brought Kamoda’s tactile world to life. Like clay turned
on a wheel, the clothes seemed to emerge in real time, catching light, casting
shadow, constantly re-forming.
Divided into a conceptually rich series, the collection
offered a masterclass in textile innovation. The Urokomon series drew from
Kamoda’s recurring use of fish scale-like patterns, employing a process where printed designs are gradually revealed by washing away parts of
the upper fabric layer, echoing the unpredictability of firing ceramics. The
Gintō pieces channeled the metallic lustre of Kamoda’s silver-glazed works,
rendered here in fabrics that folded like armor yet floated like
paper. Kaiyu used pigment printing to mimic the contrast between celadon glazes
and exposed clay, while the Engrave series featured jacquard-woven, heat-sensitive
materials that seemed to rise in waves under the touch of warmth.
The ceramicist was most keenly felt in the collection's philosophical undercurrent: the idea that everyday objects, when shaped with care and purpose carry emotional resonance
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The designs mixed the futuristic with folds that related back to origami, plus the new footwear designed with Asics. Photograph: Jay Zoo |
Each technique served not as homage, but as extension. Just
as Kamoda stretched the boundaries of what ceramics could be, so too does IM
Men stretch the assumptions of what menswear can look and feel like.
The
silhouettes ranged from space-age tailoring, coats with collars that unfolded
like origami sculptures, to garments that, when laid flat, formed geometric
shapes recalling the symmetry of wheel-thrown pots. Throughout, there was a
persistent sense of duality: structured yet soft, organic yet engineered, tactile
yet futuristic.
Iridescent textiles flashed under the blazing light; oversized hats and sculptural
outerwear veered into the surreal. But then came the contrast, a whisper-light tunic in ash green and an urbane black ensemble that grounded the show in a language
Miyake always spoke fluently: quiet innovation. These pieces captured the heart
of the brand’s legacy, where invention is not a gimmick but a way to honor
motion, simplicity, and surprise.
One of the most intriguing additions to this season’s show was the quiet debut of Issey Miyake Foot, a footwear initiative created in collaboration with Asics
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IM Men is a return to the early, rigorous work of Japanese founder Issey Miyake. Photograph: Jay Zoo |
This was also a show of new beginnings. While Homme Plissé,
Miyake’s pleated menswear staple, has now migrated to nomadic presentations
abroad, IM Men has taken its place in Paris.
And with it, a return to the
rigorous, conceptual experimentation that defined Miyake’s early career. His
influence, both aesthetic and philosophical, was everywhere. The very idea of
clothing as an extension of movement, of fabric as a medium to be sculpted,
continues to underpin the brand’s evolving identity.
One of the most intriguing additions to this season’s show
was the quiet debut of Issey Miyake Foot, a footwear initiative created in
collaboration with Asics.
The first product: Hyper Taping, a laceless shoe
built from dynamic straps that sprout from the brand’s iconic side stripe. The
result felt more like wearable sculpture than streetwear, its form recalling
cleatless football boots, its function grounded in ergonomic design. Much like
Kamoda’s vessels, these shoes seemed to reject any single purpose, instead suitable for a range of activities.
While Homme Plissé, Miyake’s pleated menswear staple, has migrated to nomadic presentations abroad, IM Men in Paris has returned to the rigorous, conceptual experimentation that defined Miyake’s early career
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The designs were contemporary but with a universality that made them feel timeless. Photograph: Jay Zoo |
At its core,
Dancing Texture was an exhibition of restraint
and risk, of translating heritage without imitating it. It asked: what happens
when the touch of the hand, the movement of the body, and the spirit of craft
converge?
Through the language of materials, IM Men found an answer that felt
neither from the past nor futuristic but rather, timeless. Kamoda may have worked
in clay, but his legacy now ripples across new surfaces, carried forward by a
house that still believes fashion can be sculpture, and that clothing, like
ceramics, can hold memory in motion.
The ceramicist was perhaps most
keenly felt in the show’s philosophical undercurrent: the idea that everyday
objects, when shaped with care and purpose, can carry emotional resonance. Just
as Kamoda’s vessels were never just decorative, these garments weren’t merely
for show. They invited a slow gaze, a reconsideration of surface and structure,
a connection between hand and material that defies trend cycles.
IM Men’s SS26 show was not about nostalgia or legacy
maintenance. It was an audacious, cerebral continuation of Issey Miyake’s
vision: that clothing is not simply designed, but engineered, often with humor,
always with intelligence, and occasionally with delightful excess. In a city
overrun with maximalism, it offered a quieter, more studied kind of
spectacle, one where fabric and light, tradition, invention and craft could all dance together.
Scroll down to see more highlights from the IM Men collection by Jay Zoo
