The artworks were installed and taken care of by Kawasaki-san and Yamamoto-san, the gallery staff, and I was finally able to visit on the last day of the exhibition. On this day, Mr. Moriyasu, the head of Moriyasu Hat Factory, introduced me to Mr. Yoshizawa, the President of Weave Toshi. Mr. Yoshizawa made a call to the designers at CA4LA to come and pay us a visit. One of them, Ms. Tanimoto graduated from an art university in Kyoto. She was wearing a black dress with lots of strings attached to it, and tried on one of my gold knitted shirts and a beaver hat decorated with gold knitting. She looked cool! I thought of her as a muse, so I wanted her to wear my shirt. But because she is a designer I couldn't force her. Mr. Yoshizawa is standing behind her in the photograph. He was wearing a Borsalino Hanchin Hat which he took off at my request to try on my Hand Wig. He looked like Dr. Hakase, the famous Japanese animation character. Junjun, the famous CA4LA designer, also tried on the Hand Wig. I think all of these designers are busy but rather than looking stressed, they are young and confident. I think they have good creative challenges and rewards form the company.
Atsuyo Kawasaki, the owner of Gallery WA2 Gallery in Tokyo, tried on a black knitted coat. When we had first met, it was in the heat of summer and I had been hurrying because I was running late. She was sitting in the hotel cafe looking gorgeous, and I just wanted to have an exhibition at her gallery. Since then I have held exhibitions at WA2 annually. She has been helpful in advising me how to develop my merchandise line of knitted shirts.
