Our Story

 

Celebrating artisanal Japanese fabrics, Hit Parade is a London-based luxury silk wear label, launched in 2022. Our collection is made with carefully selected archived Japanese silk fabrics, which were originally intended for making kimonos but have been stored in kimono stores due to changing trends. We use no virgin fabrics. Fabrics we source are individual and unique. Every piece we offer is one of a kind. Glamorous yet comfortable, our seasonless dresses and coordinates are easy to wear and non-restrictive. The Japanese silk kimono fabrics we use are durable and timeless. Did you know that kimonos are often passed down through the generations in Japan? Our collection is made in London by a tailor with over thirty years of experience.

  • The founder —

    Hit Parade was created by Junko Tajima in 2022. Born and raised in Japan, Junko moved to London in the late 1980s, following her love of British indie music and English literature. Junko was formerly a Director of Japan Licence at Burberry. During her 17 years there, she spent considerable time in Japan working with the company’s local partners, many of whom were high-quality manufacturers with uncompromising attitudes to craftsmanship. Here Junko obtained her keen sense of attention to detail and appreciation for Japanese artisanship. At the same time, Junko started seeing kimono stores closing one by one, and, when a long-standing family-run store in her hometown closed, finding another way to appreciate these precious kimono fabrics became her mission. Our label’s name pays homage to a popular music show ‘The Hit Parade’ which was on TV during the 60s and 70s in Japan. Singers used to appear dressed in ever so glamorous Western outfits on stage, which was one of Junko’s favourite earliest memories. And this is the inspiration for our collection.

  • The Collection —

    Our collection consists of five styles of dresses and one style of trouser coordinate which can easily translate from day to evening. We offer a limited number of ready to wear pieces in our collection and hold approximately ten rolls of fabric (long enough to make a dress or coordinate each) to be made to order. Each piece we make has a unique serial number, which can be found on the woven label, in the order that they were crafted. Our dresses and coordinates are generously cut and some of them are free sizing, designed to make every body shape beautiful. We can also adjust both length and garment width with our made-to-order service, so long as requirements don’t exceed the fabric meterage. Where buttons are used, they are vintage, carefully selected and bespoke to each design.

  • The Collection —

    Our collection consists of five styles of dresses and one style of trouser coordinate which can easily translate from day to evening. We offer a limited number of ready to wear pieces in our collection and hold approximately ten rolls of fabric (long enough to make a dress or coordinate each) to be made to order. Each piece we make has a unique serial number, which can be found on the woven label, in the order that they were crafted. Our dresses and coordinates are generously cut and some of them are free sizing, designed to make every body shape beautiful. We can also adjust both length and garment width with our made-to-order service, so long as requirements don’t exceed the fabric meterage. Where buttons are used, they are vintage, carefully selected and bespoke to each design.

  • The fabrics —

    All our fabrics are 100% silk and sourced from Japan. They were originally intended for making kimonos and come in a roll of approximately 37 centimetres wide and 13 meters long. This is the standard size for kimono bolts. Silk fabrics for kimonos are available in a variety of textures and weights, and we like using the crepe silk called ‘chirimen’, as it doesn’t crease easily, is durable, soft and drapes beautifully. Chirimen silk fabrics have a delicate crimped appearance and are usually woven in the Tango region in Kyoto prefecture and in Nagahama by Lake Biwa in Shiga prefecture. We use both Tango chirimen and Hama (the shortened name for Nagahama) chirimen. Some of our fabrics are hand painted by master craftspeople and some are stencil dyed using a traditional ‘katazome’ method. Producing kimono fabric takes time, usually involves many stages and different artisans. As the process is complicated, it is often difficult to obtain the background information of fabrics, but please refer to the description of each fabric for further information. If you have any questions, please contact us at konnichiwa@hitparade.studio. All our fabrics are handpicked by Junko.