18 March, 2006

The Winter Backstage

I came back from a two-week business trip to Milan and Paris. I was supposed to be an assistant for my boss, but what I did was 1)carried his luggage at airport, 2)pushed a cart, 3) made a hole in cards, 4)gave a taxi driver a tip every single time and 5)kept updating my Japanese blog mainly about what I ate. Strongly doubt about myself.

Anyway, ANTEPRIMA's Milano show was a huge success and about 400 audiences enjoyed "the Winter Stage". (I am not going to write about the press release text here. You can get more information here. I designed this page, by the way.)

On that day, I was walking about the venue with a video camera and excited to see beautiful models and celebrities. (Don't where tapes which I recorded have gone!)

And a campaign shooting in Paris also went well. A photographer is Namiko who did the last season's campaign shooting. She's very friendly, lovely and talented. Looking forward to seeing the photographs published.

1 February, 2006

Going to fashion cities

It's time to fly abroad. Since I came back to Japan, I've been dreaming of going back to the UK and Europe. And I'm glad that still I've got some opportunities in some way.

This month I'm going to Milan and Paris as an assistant for my boss for Anteprima's Milan collection.

I've never been to both cities and never travelled abroad for business. At this point, I regret that I didn't visit France and Italy when I was in the UK. If I did know Paris or Milan, it would have been helpful and advantageous for being an assistant. At least I'd have known how to buy a Metro ticket. (The reason why I didn't visit was because I thought flying to both cities was very probable. France and Italy are popular destinations in Japan and close to us. In fact, flight tickets are not so expensive. So I didn't hurry up and go there. As a result, I found myself fitting in North such as Oslo, Berlin and Dublin...)

Well, I didn't expect I'd go to Milan for business. Who knows? I was expecting to go there sooner or later in some way. But this month? Very exciting. There're so many things I've never done, seen and experienced. But the two-week trip - the first week is for the Milan collection and the second one is for a photo shooting in Paris - must be fun.

My anxiety is a pile of work to be done before I leave.

18 July, 2005

Vesterålen

After I flew to Oslo, I came far up north, Stokmarknes, one of the main cities in Vesterålen. This area may be more famous for Lofoten, which is the islands located next to Vesterålen.

I flew from Oslo to Evenes (the Harstad/Narvik airport), and took a bus to Stokmarknes, passing through Sortland.

I will write more as soon as I get back to Japan.

Posted at 22:16. There is still the sun. Yes, this is the midnight sun.

14 July, 2005

Summer in Oslo

After the graduation ceremony, I flew to Oslo. With hot days reaching over 25°C, I cannot remember how cold it was when I came here in Christmas in 2003.

People are enjoying the sun in the park. Trees are greener than anything else. It doesn't get dark until the midnight. Well, probably I can say this. Summer is the best time to visit Oslo, although I like the city in winter.

I'll put some photos soon.

Posted at 21:08.

24 February, 2005

A spoilt kid gone to New York

I've gone to NY without saying anything here. More than two weeks there was no update and message here. Now, however, blog.ausp.net has come back.

This was a family trip. I was very surprised at the situation, that is, another flight just after coming back from Cardiff, and so I was, kind of, embarrassed to say. However, now, I'm telling what the trip was like.

Before I left Japan, I was planning two things; One is to visit some web design offices based in New York, but I was "busy" at working for Steafán's website and etc, and therefore I couldn't possibly make arrangements - even sending e-mails. But, the true reason was I couldn't be realistic about it. This is partly because I decided to settle in Japan for some years. Experiences in Berlin gave me a sense of confidence and a quite optimistic view of knocking on the door of design offices.

The other is to meet my friend in Austin, Texas. Not only for a happy reunion with him and sightseeing in Texas, but also for discuss his project which I might undertake, I wanted to visit him. But I couldn't find any cheap ticket from New York to Austin, and most of tickets cost more than ones we paid for flying from Tokyo to New York (you can imagine how cheap the tickets were).

Anyway, this trip became a pure family trip in the end.

New York is a great city. Exciting, cool, awesome, etc. But it's too far. 13-hour-flight is too much. I don't get tired so much from 11-hour-flight to London, but extra two hours gives me a last punch. In addition, for the first few days, I suffered from jet lag. Usually I don't get it, but this time it was quite severe. What I remember from the first half was a litany of mail-order TV programmes at 4am, daytime bad temper and endless yawning.

But the sightseeing, of course, went on, and I fell in love with New York. We also went to Boston in the second week, when we might have flown to Texas if possible. Boston is also a lovely city. Compact, cozy, etc. Also some elements of Britishness relaxed me.

Throughout the trip I was thinking many things. They will be my blog topics here. I'm going to write them soon.

28 January, 2005

It's time to show off - a story of eBoy in Berlin

One day I happned to see again guys of eBoy, which is Berlin-based pixel art group on a Japanese magazine, called Popeye. In this issue, Popeye offers a special T-shirt designed by Paul Smith and eBoy to its 800 subscribers. Looks cool, so I entered for it, of course.

I don't know to what extent eBoy is popular in Japan. But let's assume that eboy is getting bigger in Japan. Then, if so, maybe it can be time to show off my story related to eBoy. To tell the truth, I have met guys of eBoy before. This is why I wrote "again" at the beginning.

Last November I went to Berlin. I had been interested in their artwork, and therefore, I tried to contact eBoy to ask if I could visit their office. I didn't expect much I would get an answer from them. But I did receive a mail saying "sure!". When I visited, there were fortunately all members of eBoy, including Peter Stemmler who normally working in New York. They're very nice and friendly despite being busy. And I left there with many kinds of gifts - postcards, autographs and an T-shirt. Oh I might have had a cake, a photo (see the right photo) reminds me... I was quite pulsated, and so don't remember what I was doing. The only thing I remember is that I was talking about boring stuff but they were very nice, though.

Anyway, this is a story I wanted to tell you (or show off). I've been waiting for this opportunity. Hope you enjoyed... I know this is boring.

» eBoy - browse/basic_foto/paulsmith

» Popeye