The footwear brand “grounds,” with its impressive decorative outsole, has established a firm position in the Japanese fashion scene. The shoes used to be for subculture youth until a few years ago, and now even mode lovers are following the trend.
The man behind this project is Mikio Sakabe, who graduated first in fashion from the Antwerp Royal Academy of Fine Arts, and has been involved in the management of MIKIOSAKABE and the fashion school coconogacco, and has left various impacts on the Japanese fashion industry over the past decade. He is well respected in the industry for his ability to comfortably circumvent the existing fashion system in Japan, and to use his rich creative abilities trained in Antwerp in a multitude of fields. We asked him about the identity of grounds from various angles.
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Beyond “face” fashion: shoes that elevate the human form from the ground up
-How would you describe grounds? Please tell us about how the brand came this far.
Sakabe: grounds is a footwear brand symbolized by its distinctive outsole. Four years have passed since its establishment, and I feel that it is growing steadily despite its ups and downs.
-How did you come to launch another shoe brand when you already own fashion brand, MIKIOSAKABE?
Sakabe: In recent years, clothes were definitely designed around the head, undoubtedly based on the idea that “intelligence is important,” as in shirts and jackets made to draw the eye to the face.
Born in 1976, MIKIO SAKABE is a fashion designer and designer. In 2007-08, his eponymous fashion brand MIKIO SAKABE debuted at the Paris Collections for the fall/winter season in a presentation format, and in 2019, he established a brand specializing in footwear, GROUNDS. In 2019, he founded grounds, a brand specializing in footwear.
Sakabe: However, fashion is something that reflects the fresh air of the times, considering the relationship between humans and society. In this regard, we felt that we needed to propose a “new image of human beings” for the next era. So I was looking for a different approach, and I realized that if the shoes were distinctive, people would look at the whole body and see it in a different way than before.
-I see, so the next step was to focus on the feet.
Sakabe: Yes. We thought that we could propose a new image of human beings by thinking from the feet, rather than focusing on the head and face. grounds is a brand that literally thinks of design from the feet of humans, who are grounded to the earth, and we are developing designs that appear to be the basis of styling.
It is also interesting to note that shoes are approached differently from clothing, having architectural elements and being the farthest from the face and the most important product in the relationship between the earth and people.
-How did you come up with those ideas in the first place?
Sakabe: It often starts with dissatisfaction with the current situation or existing products. For example, sneakers have evolved with an emphasis on functionality, such as ease of movement and lightness, but that alone is boring. What if fashion was added to that? We incorporate such ideas into our designs.
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Identity forged through “relationships“
-What was the concept for the initial model, and what was it like?
Sakabe: The concept of “grounds” is to “change the relationship between humans and the earth (gravity). The outsole (the part of the sole), which is the most important part that embodies this concept, has its own name, the oldest being “INTERSTELLAR” and “JEWELRY. The clear color and tall shape of the outsole is also used in other later designs, and is still a core part of the shoe.
-Why did you focus on such features?
Sakabe: When I thought about recreating the relationship between humans and the earth (gravity), the first thing that came to mind was to have a “floating” feeling. To achieve this, we added thickness to the outsole in order to lift the foot off the ground, which is always touched with the ground. Then, to avoid making the shoes too heavy, we used a clear light material.
-Any difficulties in the actual manufacturing of the shoes?
Sakabe: When started, it was difficult to find a manufacturing factory. I used to make clothes, but I knew nothing about the shoemaking process. Sneakers, in particular, are a special field, and there were no factories that we could ask to work with because their business partners such as NIKE and adidas had rules about not leaking their technology to other brands. We searched and searched, and finally found a factory in Indonesia that we are still working with today.
-Is there anything that is important to you in the production of grounds items?
Sakabe： The design of grounds is basically neutral, and we plan and manage it as a team. My role is to check the items that are released each season closely, but the team takes the lead in the new items that are released every week, and I rarely have any say in the details.
-What do you pay attention to when designing as a team?
Sakabe: Sharing the same value. If there is an environment where we can share the mood and values that form the basis of the design, it is possible to develop a product from 1 to 100 within the team. Also, if you have a good balance of designers with different tastes on the team, so that the overall atmosphere is in various directions, you can naturally create interesting products.
-So you value relationships in the production process as well?
Sakabe: That’s right. In terms of presentation, at grounds, we don’t show the shoes as individual items, but rather emphasize the relationships within the collection, such as the gradation of colors and the unevenness when the shoes are placed side by side. I want customers to choose what they like among them.
