Blog: Vintage Japanese Kimono Culture News
YokoDana Customer Highlights: Wedding Guest Dress from Vintage Kimono Fabrics
July 26, 2018 • Yoko Lewis
Our customer Heather with her husband Rich at a wedding in Westerly, RI  About these pictures: For years now, whenever we do shows, whether it's a quilt show, a Japanese cherry blossom festival or an Anime event, we often have customers tell us that they'll send us a picture when they make something from the fabrics they just bought from us. The above are from one of those situations. Heather bought the shown fabrics from our by-piece rack at a quilt show in Connecticut last year. So imagine our pleasant surprise when these pictures arrived in our email. So, we are...
What to call kimono parts: Kimono Wearing (Kitsuke) Items -- japaninsides.com
January 23, 2018 • Yoko Lewis
We've been following the images of this group, Japan Inside (actually http://japaninsides.com ) as they have some excellent and different posts of all sorts of Japanese cultural scenes -- old traditional and new -- on Facebook and elsewhere: which is where we found this handy chart for our kitsuke fans (kimono-wearers):  For more detailed experts' definition of terms, and read about all things Kimono and Geisha, check out Immortal Geisha (Once on our FAQ page about Immortal Geisha HERE, just scroll down a page to see their Forum, Wiki and Facebook links).
About the Color Shuiro: Japanese Conception of Red - Is Red the Color of Love?
February 08, 2017 • Yoko Lewis
Above Source: David Klapp, Photolibrary (japanese.about.com) 5253 Here at YokoDana Kimono we often are tasked with coming up with English color labels for the seemingly infinite array of colors in Japanese kimonos and fabrics which we post on our site. This is especially challenging when it comes to the many shades of red used In traditional Japanese arts. Perhaps the most famous red is shuiro, translated as vermillion. Shuiro is seen on the Torii gates leading to shrines in Japan (above, top picture), and also in various types of kimonos, often as fringe or border, as well as in higher-end nagajuban...
Response to the Reddit Controversy(Boston Kimono Wearing)
September 08, 2016 • Yoko Lewis
We posted about this a few months ago in our blog HERE. Today we came across this photo response to it by Tangerine Mountain, a company selling vintage kimonos at Anime conventions and wanted to share it: They had this to say explaining the pictures:  A Photo Response to Protests Against the M.F.A. Boston Kimono Exhibit  At Tangerine Mountain, we are proud to serve ALL customers, regardless of ethnicity or race, ability or disability, religion or creed, sexual identity or orientation.  We believe wholeheartedly that kimono are for everyone.  So do a lot of Japanese folks.  When Claude Monet’s “La Japonaise”...
YokoDana Kimono Culture News: Tips for foreigners, how to wear kimono(aug2016)
August 10, 2016 • Yoko Lewis
YokoDana Kimono Kimono Culture News: Thanks to japannow.com, for this August 10, 2016 news piece about a service started in Tokyo for visiting foreigners to Japan. It has pointers which our (www.yokodana.com) fans might appreciate. It's short enough we'll post the whole thing below; Link to original article is here): TOKYO — Bettergeta.com was established in 2014 by a team of experts in the field of kimono wearing. The company has over 50 years of experience when it comes to the art of the kimono. Having opened a school for teaching students how to wear this historic garment, Bettergeta.com recently...