DESCENDANT

The first time I bought and wore a polo shirt was in the late ’80s when I was in junior high school.
POPEYE greatly influenced me, I can’t remember if it was in pink or peppermint, but I remember shopping with my friend, going to “VOICE” in Harajuku.

At that time, it was also the era when polo shirts began to take on various cultures.
In England, there was a rude boy look, in the US, there was a hip-hop style. This cultural take also happened in France and Jamaica.
It’s the same polo shirt but worn differently by brands and fit.
The polo shirts were easily recognized from the classy, preppy, punk, hip-hop lovers and bad boy styles.
Each style had its own way of wearing them and it was also a symbol of their identity.

The British polos were worn like a shirt, whereas the French and American ones had a sports-like taste.
When I was younger, sleeves puffing up was a characteristic and I felt restricted in this unique silhouette. Additionally, there was a time when I avoided ones with logos.

Speaking of logos, in the ’90s, it was interesting to see the reinterpretation of polo shirts as cool biz attire, such as uniforms for American carrier services and IT corporate uniforms in Silicon Valley. I’ve been interested in them since back in the day, but as time passed, it’s been reinterpreted to something out of style but unintentionally cool.

I feel like people who have followed the traditional fashion wear polo shirts well. I think people who carry on sports culture, such as tennis, are cool. But for most, polo shirts are surprisingly unfashionable items. When living in a mixed culture, it’s a challenging classic item to wear and there is no particular reason to pick it up unless you find an intentional reason for wearing it.

So, for Descendants, there are no ribs on the sleeve ends, cutting straight at the hem, eliminating the sleeves creeping up causing a height difference, and the collar is widely spread so that you can wear it like a T-shirt.
The material is a wide weave loose silhouette that can be coordinated more easily than traditional polos. We also make ones with a plain weave fabric, which is closer in feel to a T-shirt.

Since I spoke about polo shirts today, I want to wear them. (Laughs)

Spoken by TETSU NISHIYAMA