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Ugolini/Vass project with Isetan was quite a few years ago Perceptions for domestic brands have changed quite a bit since. Isetan is all pushing Made in Japan now (possibly since the earthquake).
In the past few years, Isetan teamed with: Otsuka, Tsukui Reiko (Lecott), Yoshiharu Hasegawa, Union Imperial for exclusive offerings. The Isetan exclusive full hand made Otsuka Limited shoes are priced at 200K JPY, directly aimed at top priced imported shoes.
But of course, Isetan still does collab with foreign brands too. Not long ago, they had a special MTO (design your own) fair with Crockett & Jones, not something any store can pull off.
Isetan must had a long list of Japanese cordwainers to team up with and in the end they went with Roberto Ugolino for design and Vass
to scale the production front.
I guess it's possibly economics and logistics of: shortage of skilled labour coupled with production cost in Japan. So the niche to target the
high-end & high-margin bespoke market.
Ugolini/Vass project with Isetan was quite a few years ago Perceptions for domestic brands have changed quite a bit since. Isetan is all pushing Made in Japan now (possibly since the earthquake).
In the past few years, Isetan teamed with: Otsuka, Tsukui Reiko (Lecott), Yoshiharu Hasegawa, Union Imperial for exclusive offerings. The Isetan exclusive full hand made Otsuka Limited shoes are priced at 200K JPY, directly aimed at top priced imported shoes.
But of course, Isetan still does collab with foreign brands too. Not long ago, they had a special MTO (design your own) fair with Crockett & Jones, not something any store can pull off.
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