In the world of high fashion, where boundaries are not merely pushed but dissolved entirely, few names evoke as much reverence and curiosity as Comme des Garçons. The very name—French for “like boys”—is paradoxical, subtle, and richly ironic, hinting at gender defiance long before it became a Comme Des Garcons mainstream subject of discourse. Rei Kawakubo, the enigmatic founder of the brand, has long insisted that her work is not fashion but creation. In her hands, cloth is not draped but broken, mended, resurrected. Through her collections, she crafts not simply clothes, but philosophical manifestos—cryptic, unsettling, and bold.
The metaphor “unzipping the horizon with a gloved hand of broken steel” encapsulates the essence of this brand. It suggests force with elegance, a disassembling of the known world, and the revelation of a new, often uncomfortable truth. This blog explores the deeper meanings and poetic tensions behind that phrase, unfolding it through the lens of Comme des Garçons—where each garment is a crack in the concrete of cultural uniformity, and each collection is a gesture toward new realities.
Deconstruction as Revelation
To unzip the horizon is to pierce the veil of expectation. Comme des Garçons has never played by the rules of conventional beauty. From the infamous “Hiroshima chic” collection of 1981, where tattered and asymmetrical black garments were received with equal parts confusion and awe, to more recent shows featuring headless mannequins or bulbous silhouettes that obscured the female form, Kawakubo consistently questions: what is fashion supposed to do?
Each collection seems to tear apart the stitched seams of aesthetic conformity. Just as a gloved hand might soften the grip of cold steel, the brand tempers harsh structural experimentation with rich textures and delicate thought. In Comme des Garçons, deconstruction is not destruction; it is revelation. The zipper is not just a closure, but a mechanism of transformation, a seam that can be undone to show what lies beneath—whether that is vulnerability, defiance, or simply a refusal to conform.
Armor and Vulnerability: The Broken Steel Glove
A glove of broken steel is an arresting image—at once protective and damaged, elegant and dangerous. It suggests that even in strength there is fracture. Kawakubo’s designs often resemble armor: padded shoulders, cocooning forms, industrial fabrics. Yet there’s always a paradox in the presentation. The armor protects, but also isolates. It reshapes the body but sometimes renders it alien. It signals resilience, but not without hinting at the cost.
In a world obsessed with polish, Comme des Garçons embraces the imperfect. Torn edges, raw hems, asymmetric constructions—all are signatures of a brand that sees incompleteness not as a flaw but as a state of becoming. The “broken steel” may represent our modern identities—strong, yet fragmented; put together, yet visibly cracking under the weight of expectation. Kawakubo’s glove of design does not attempt to smooth over these fissures. Instead, it frames them, honors them, and asks us to find beauty within them.
Unzipping Gender, Culture, and Time
Comme des Garçons has always operated in a liminal space—between East and West, masculinity and femininity, modernity and memory. Unzipping the horizon, in this context, becomes a metaphor for peeling away cultural dogmas. What remains when gendered clothing is stripped of its coded language? What happens when the body becomes abstract, and the self is no longer defined by shape, silhouette, or even face?
Kawakubo’s work challenges our relationship with identity. Her runway shows are often described as performance art, where the models become moving sculptures. In these presentations, time itself feels unzipped. Historical references merge with futuristic silhouettes, traditional Japanese aesthetics intermingle with punk rebellion. There is a sense of floating—not forward, not backward, but elsewhere.
This destabilization is intentional. It encourages viewers to let go of the linear narrative of fashion trends, and instead engage in a circular, cyclical, and fragmented form of storytelling. Like a zipper that can be pulled both ways, time in Comme des Garçons moves in recursive, erratic patterns, each loop revealing another layer of meaning.
The Violence of Creation
To unzip is a gentle action, but it carries connotations of exposure, of revealing something hidden. In the language of Comme des Garçons, this act is not merely physical but conceptual. Clothing becomes a site of conflict: between wearer and observer, between self and society, between comfort and constraint.
The use of the term “violence” is not incidental here. Many of Kawakubo’s collections deal with themes of disfigurement, restriction, and even trauma. Whether it’s dresses that bulge unnaturally or fabrics scorched and torn, the body in her work is often under siege. But there is a subtext of empowerment beneath this brutalism. By displaying the wounds—be they physical, emotional, or cultural—Kawakubo does not trivialize them. She monumentalizes them. Fashion, under her direction, becomes a way of documenting damage and transcending it.
The broken steel glove, then, becomes the perfect symbol: a hand armored for resistance, yet open enough to touch, feel, unzip.
Comme des Garçons as a Philosophical Act
To engage with Comme des Garçons is not merely to wear fashion but to enter a dialogue—one that is often uncomfortable, always challenging, and deeply rewarding. Kawakubo herself rarely explains her work, famously refusing interviews or simple answers. This resistance to interpretation forces the audience into active participation. We must make sense of the garments ourselves, unzipping our own assumptions in the process.
Every piece, every show, is a thesis. Not all are meant to be understood. Some are simply meant to be experienced, as one might experience poetry or avant-garde cinema. The glove is on our hand too; we are part of this machinery. The broken steel is not just hers—it is a reflection of the world we live in, one where certainty is shattered and meaning is fragmented.
Yet in that fragmentation, there is liberation. There is beauty in the jagged edges, in the open zippers that refuse to close. Kawakubo’s work reminds us that fashion need not be about selling dreams. It can be about awakening—about dragging us, gently or not, into a fuller awareness of self and society.
Conclusion: A Brand Beyond Fashion
“Unzipping the horizon with a gloved hand of broken steel” is not just a poetic abstraction—it is the very ethos of Comme des Garçons. It is how the brand opens new worlds by ripping apart old ones. Comme Des Garcons Hoodie It is how it balances elegance with rupture, strength with vulnerability. And most importantly, it is how it invites us not to consume fashion, but to question it.
In a world obsessed with smooth surfaces and instant comprehension, Comme des Garçons offers resistance. It offers art. It offers the slow, unsettling beauty of not knowing exactly what you’re seeing—but being moved by it nonetheless. It asks us to wear the unknown. To unzip our own assumptions. And to step, armored but open, into the broken steel of the future.