Issey Miyake started experimenting with machine-made pleats in 1988 and launched his lightweight Pleats Please Issey Miyake line in 1993, which was innovative on both construction and textile fronts. Traditionally pleats are made before a garment is cut and sewn. Miyake reversed that process, creating pleated garments from single lengths of polyester sized two to three times larger than their final form (to account for heat shrinkage). The designer then folded the garments as if for storage; only then were they wrapped in paper and put through a machine that forms permanent pleats using heat and pressure.
Miyake’s mostly pastel-hued Spring 1995 show featured plenty of folds, presented to 8th-century Asian music performed live by the Liu Ensemble, who, like the models, were pleat-clad to show, Miyake told The New York Times, “that there is just one world for everyone.” Indeed there was a fusion of East and West throughout in silhouettes that borrowed from Noh theater as well as bikers. Miyake’s architectural and dramatic Minaret dresses referenced paper lanterns and Paul Poiret’s famous lampshade dress. The most magical and uplifting moment occurred about halfway through, when a group of barefoot models stood in place as their pleated and hooped Minaret dresses bounced, in Slinky-like fashion, up and down, up and down, around their slender forms.
