Through previously unpublished drawings from 1981 to 1999, a new book reveals how the Japanese designer transforms ideas into garments.
For Yohji Yamamoto, designing begins with fabric. Its weight, texture and movement suggest how it might be cut and shaped around the body. Drawing helps communicate these ideas to those responsible for constructing his clothes. ‘Yohji Yamamoto Drawings’, a new book by fashion historian Alexandre Samson, published by Thames & Hudson, explores this essential aspect of his creative process.
The book brings together 183 illustrations from his menswear and womenswear collections between 1981 and 1999, discovered in a Tokyo warehouse in 2024. Executed in pencil, ink and marker, these sketches were working documents rather than finished artworks, providing a visual language shared with his pattern makers.
For Yamamoto, drawing allows him to express ideas he finds difficult to communicate verbally. Yet the sketch is never definitive. Working directly with fabric, pins and scissors, he experiments on mannequins and models, allowing garments to evolve through fittings and collaboration.
This dialogue between drawing, pattern and fabric helps explain his asymmetric constructions, unconventional silhouettes and exploration of the relationship between clothing and the body. The finished garment can differ considerably from its original sketch.
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