Isetan Mitsukoshi's Contemporary Kimono

During Japan's Meiji period, as the country began opening up its borders, the Mitsukoshi department store advertised the contemporary Western image to its customers and then “modernized” the traditional kimono while still keeping integral aspects of the clothing. The West underwent a dramatic change in the age of Industrialization and while Japan did absorb some characteristics of Western practice and art, the unique culture and customs were adapted and altered rather than replaced. During the Art Nouveau period, the idea of design reform emerging as a reaction against industrialization set forth a form of  legitimization for design on a global scale. This was shown through Isetan Mitsukoshi's decision to “stylize” and re-introduce the kimono through techniques such as sensegiving, re-contextualizing and opening up this design style in-house and to the greater world. 

Contextual information from Legitimizing the Contemporary Kimono in the Era
of Art Nouveau — An Analysis of Mitsukoshi’s Promotional Discourse by Saskia Thoelen