MISHA JANETTE
Fashion Journalist / Editor
Misha Janette became interested in the unique culture of Japan, which differed greatly from her native United States, and moved to Japan on her own. She has been active as a fashion journalist and stylist in a plethora of media, such as newspapers, magazines, TV and the Internet. This April, she officially started her blog, “Tokyo Fashion Diaries,” and the abundant topics that she picks up based on her own aesthetic sense, regardless of fame of what she reports on, have garnered considerable attention both in Japan and abroad. We interviewed Misha, who eight years after arriving in Japan, is strengthening her presence in Japan as one of Tokyo’s leading fashion icons with her unique fashion style.
What made you decide to work in Japan?
Misha: I’m from Washington State, and when I was in the 4th grade, my homeroom teacher, who was Japanese-American, taught me origami, gave me Japanese sweets, and introduced me to a Japanese pen pal. The letters that arrived from my Japanese pen pal were so cutely decorated, and I always looked forward to getting them. This was the first time I became aware of a country called Japan. When I was in high school, programs such as “Sailor Moon” and “Pokémon” aired on TV, and the coloring of these characters was unique and the ideas were completely different from the U.S., and I became more interested in Japan. So in my third year of high school, I came to Japan as an exchange student, and this experience was what first led me to my current job.
Did you study fashion from when you were in the States?
Misha: I studied graphic design in the United States, but I’d always wanted to study fashion. When I studied in Japan, I was in the Kansai area, and when I went people-watching in Shinsaibashi and Amerikamura, I found that people thought nothing about mixing and matching colors together in crazy cacophonies (laughs). I wanted to understand this culture better, and I made friends in Japan, so I decided to try studying fashion in Japan and enrolled at the Bunka Fashion College.
Were you aiming to be a fashion journalist from back then?
Misha: At first, I was aspiring to be a stylist. However, when I was a student, I was introduced to someone who wrote fashion articles in the English “Japan Times” newspaper, and I briefly became his assistant. After I graduated from school, he left the “Japan Times,” and he asked if I would write in his stead. I had absolutely no confidence, but I couldn’t say no and decided to take the opportunity. This led to requests several media, and before I knew it, I had a lot of work as a fashion journalist (laughs).
Please tell us about your blog Tokyo Fashion Diaries that you started this April.
Misha: At the beginning, I was thinking about creating a blog to introduce Japanese fashion to people outside Japan. But the information on young designers that I write about in my blog are often not covered by Japanese magazines, and I wanted Japanese people to know about them too, so I decided to make my blog bilingual. Chinese is also available, but this is a translation done by the blog's fans and they send it to me. It is very difficult to edit pictures, design the site, and do the programming all on my own, but it’s a lot of fun.
Do you have a different approach when working on your usual work and on your blog?
Misha: I write in an analytic manner in my work for newspapers, etc, but in my blog I write as though I’m talking to myself. I don’t post articles in a particularly planned manner; I just post what I genuinely feel to be interesting depending on my mood at that time, much like how my outfits change on a daily basis. This is something that I can do because it’s a blog, and it allows me to introduce brands that would otherwise be difficult to feature in media such as newspapers due to name recognition, etc.
