05/14/2008 - Sam Kikaku Co., LTD.

is an Osaka-China based accessories company. They are showing samples of their selection in Design Festa East’s first floor. They have a range of goods including: belts, slippers (also known as flipflops), scarves, mittens and hats to name a few. Again, to my dismay items must be purchased in bulk. The staff are really nice and there are choco-pies sitting on the table to eat! Ya’ll come round now.
Here is their website to check them out: http://www.samplan.jp

02:52pm | Add comment | Written by: Design Festa

05/14/2008 - Magnet!!

is taking appointments and orders (in bulk) for their collections of cute, funky-fresh accessories beginning today until the end of the week on Friday, May 16th. Although I was disappointed to learn that I would need to buy 100 pairs of the mittens I was eying out, it’s good news for store and boutique owners. Magnet, a 6 year old Japan based business to business company, is showing some of their cutest stuff in Design Festa East on the second floor. They sell accessories like belts, scarves, earmuffs, beanies, key chains, mittens, hats and key chains. I swear I’ve seen at least half of the stuff while shopping in Lalaport, Shibuya109 and Harajuku. It is really interesting how much boutiques markup wholesale prices. If 99 other people want to go in on buying a belt let me know!!!
Here is a telephone to contact Magnet if you are interested: 06 6395 7777
and a Fax too: 06 6395 7778

01:02pm | Add comment | Written by: Megan

05/13/2008 - 4 sleeps to go!

The countdown is really on now for Design Festa Vol. 27!! Only 4 more sleeps to go!! The Design Festa Gallery here in Harajuku is starting to get a bit quiet now, with most artists concentrating on the weekend’s event. There is however quite a bit of action going on in Gallery EAST today though with some new exhibits setting up, so not too too quiet! I’ll put up some photos here when it’s all ready!

02:26pm | Add comment | Written by: Amelia

05/10/2008 - Live Painting in the rainy garden!

Designer TifdyL who is exhibiting in WEST 2C this week as part of the Mamagoto exhibition, is doing some live painting in the garden this afternoon! Not discouraged by the wet weather, the sometimes Canada-based sometimes Japan-based artist has set up under cover outside. It’s fascinating to watch a work unfold before your eyes like this! We’ve actually been treated to quite a bit of live painting since Mamagoto have taken up residence in the gallery, and I have to say I’ve been enjoying it very much. I’ll miss you guys next week!

06:00pm | Add comment | Written by: Amelia

05/10/2008 - From London!

David and Lisa came to Japan from Australia (they are from London) and dropped by the gallery this Thursday. They saw our flyer at Narita Airport but disapponinted finding out they wouldn’t be in Japan on the event day. The last day of their staying in Tokyo, they came to Harajuku and found our flyer in a shop again so they were wondering if Design Festa Gallery was near by… Finally they got here! They seemed like to enjoy their time here and got some paintings too. I couldn’t help feeing a destiny between them and us…

Well, finally there are only 2 more days left to check this Mamagoto project whish is probably having a biggest amount of sweets in the gallery ever, not to be missed!!

02:35pm | Add comment | Written by: Takeshi

05/08/2008 - Mamagoto Room - 1c

Everything in this room looks fresh and happy, you almost can smell a scent of lemon or oranges. One part of the room shows drawings of flowers, put in a beautiful wooden frame. It also offers professionally made T-Shirts and scarfs with paintings of flowers on them. The colors are very spring time like. The artist even published a book with flower drawings.
The other part of the room from the artist called Matsukamaki from Saitama looks quite different. Colorful and happy though, but illustrations of cute things and people.

04:29pm | Add comment | Written by: Karen

05/08/2008 - Mamagoto - Toy Camera

It is quite surprising how much you can do with a little toy camera. You work with different light, foreground and backround and (mostly intense) colors. Room West 1G is shared by 15 people until monday. You can see how different they used the little cameras and how different they present their output.

03:41pm | Add comment | Written by: Karen

05/07/2008 - Illust

The Mamagoto takeover continues with 4 artists in West 1-D. All 4 artists show their interpretations of girls/women in various forms usually involving paint and canvas, and sometimes collage. This room continues the Mamagoto theme and the four artists depictions seem to cover the range from girlhood through teen to adulthood. Looking around the room at the different styles is a trip.

03:58pm | Add comment | Written by: Megan

05/07/2008 - Edible Sweets!!

More sweets in the West:Art Piece room. If after staring at the Apricot Cafe treats you get a little bit hungry, turn around and Tri-Cafe has just the fix for you! These Sweets are actually Edible. As much as I like accessories, I love FOOD even more. You can pick up a bag of coffee for ¥210 or some whimsical bird shaped tea and cinnamon cookies for ¥105. The coffee is first rate and is a special togomama mix (it was astutely pointed out to me that togomama is the characters of mamagoto backwards). It appears that Tri Cafe is opening at the end of the month near JR Ebisu station. They are having a workshop and party on May 31 starting at 6:30pm. If you want more info come on by or try to check out: http://eat-tokyo.jp/

03:37pm | Add comment | Written by: Megan

05/07/2008 - Eco by Deco

Deco has an exhibition going on in 1b that captures a recent fashion/environmental combo phenomenon: the eco bag or “Mai [my] baggu” in Japanese. I’ll leave it to Deco to explain the exhibition:
“These days you often catch a glimpse of ecobags don’t you? And shops that are using plastic bags carefully are also becoming more common. Even if you are not thinking deeply about the envrionment, ‘my bag’ is more cute than the plastic bag. By just carrying an eco bag, doesn’t your heart become joyful? They’re cute and kind to the environment and for those reasons please think about using them.
The bag is good but ‘my chopsticks’ are also becoming more common. And for little kids, how about ‘my spoon’ and ‘my fork’. Won’t you start living the cute-eco lifestyle?”
Adults Chopsticks: ¥1200, Kids Chopsticks: ¥1000, bags various prices.

03:36pm | Add comment | Written by: Louise