One day in the mid-‘90s when trans-Atlantic Concorde flights still epitomised glamour, Mumbai entrepreneur Mina Krishnan found herself sitting across the aisle from Issey Miyake – the man who put Japan on the global fashion map. She nodded, he smiled, acknowledging her outfit – an all-black Miyake, designed to cover a multitude of sins and spills.
That ensemble is one of the 72 pieces of Issey Miyake couture now on display at an art gallery in Mumbai’s Khotachiwadi; it is potentially the single-largest private collection of Issey Miyake in the country.
The dedicated fashionista died in August 2022, two days before Miyake – both claimed by cancer. Subsequently, her husband, advertising’s Mohan Krishnan, and daughter Ayesha Hamilton decided to bequeath her collection to charity, raising funds for Child Rights and You (CRY). All 72 pieces at the exhibition have been bought by a single collector who prefers to remain anonymous.
The collection on display is a mix of limited edition and vintage Miyake from his famous Pleats Please and 132.5 lines – created with mathematical precision using upcycled material – as well as numbered pieces from HaaT, A-POC and Bao Bao collections.
Miyaki, who worked in Paris and New York, was inspired by the Japanese concept of “monozukuri” which literally means production or making of things. Adhering to that philosophy he not only created his own cloth but also became one of the first designers to create garments using material other than cloth.
Mina Krishnan who founded Lotus Learning Pvt Limited, and was the founder chairman of Indian Direct Selling Association, didn’t subscribe to Miyake for “fashionable” clothes. She bought the designs that spoke to her – taking extra delight in his blazing oranges, reds and yellows. His clothes became like second skin for her – fitting every size and every mood. She wore his couture to a seven-course fine dine events, to parties in Goa, to theatre evenings in Mumbai, and even when she went out to grab idlis.
Her family reveals that her interest in the works of writer, philosopher, entertainer Alan Wilson Watts (known for his pop culture interpretations of Chinese, Japanese and Indian traditions) developed into a life-long interest in Zen. She learnt to speak Japanese and also delved into hiragana and katagana, the cursive and angular forms of Japanese syllabic writing. In 1988, she chanced upon a small Issey Miyake store at Orchard Street in Singapore, and was floored by his vision. Miyake’s sinuous fabric, the big birds and flowers splashed on the plated drapes and the bold colours instantly resonated with her own sense of quirkiness. It was coup de foudre if you will.
Starting from her first buy in Singapore, Krishnan bought her Miyakes from across the world – Rome, London, Paris, New York. The Miyake store in NYC’s Tribeca welcomed her like one of their own. She pulled off the clothes with flair – first with her fancy Ferragamo close-toed shoes, and later, with the limitation of bunions on her feet, with Nike’s Virgil Abloh range, Louis Vuitton sandals, and limited-edition Fit Flops.
“Even near the end, while going to the hospital for chemo, radiation or surgery, mom wore her Miyakes and her fun shoes,” says her daughter Ayesha Hamilton, a lawyer based in New Jersey. “Miyake’s yellow was her favourite colour.”
Ayesha recalls how Mina went through great pain and effort to train the dry-cleaning technicians at Phoenix Laundry, located in Vashi, to handle her Miyake pleats lest they got ironed out.
“Miyake wasn’t as mainstream as Louis Vuitton or Prada. You had to be immensely confident of yourself to pull off his clothes, especially at a time when most people in India hadn’t even heard about him,” says interior designer Kalindi Kilachand who was a close friend of Mina Krishnan’s.
She was so inspired by the Japanese designer that she even persuaded her husband to start wearing his pleated jackets. After her death, the Krishnan family reached out to architect Ratan Batliboi to curate the exhibition chronicling this Mina-Miyake love story. On the family’s decision to donate her collection to charity, Krishnan reveals that when Mina made her first significant monies from her company Lotus Learning, she donated a substantial part of it to CRY.
The family wanted this send-off to reflect all things Mina.
Aditi Shah-Bhimjyani writes on fashion and culture