Memories of kimono, handed down in a kimono house. The European art of pattern-making and tailoring, refined in a couture house. The two met in a mother, Izumi Taniguchi, and her daughter, Rieko Kitahara — and Maison Brijean was born.
The kimono shop of Izumi Taniguchi's family is founded. Living day to day alongside kimono, she inherited their beauty and the culture that lies behind it.
Rieko Kitahara's grandmother opens a made-to-measure salon in Himeji. Refining the European art of pattern-making and tailoring, the salon has used Europe's finest fabrics to tailor clothing for each individual client. Later, Izumi Taniguchi, born into the kimono shop, marries into the family, and the two houses are joined. The salon continues today as Brijean, and the Maison Brijean salon is located within it.
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Rieko Kitahara spends two and a half years in Paris, studying couture pattern-making and tailoring at ESMOD and haute couture embroidery at École Lesage. After returning to Japan, she builds her experience under her grandmother, the salon's founder, and has refined her tailoring at the Himeji salon for some twenty years.
The discerning eye of the mother — born into a kimono house, she has bridged two worlds within a couture house — unites with the daughter's couture skills, and Maison Brijean is born. Regarding kimono as one of the world's finest textiles, we tailor couture that exists only once in the world.
Maison Brijean is led by a mother and her daughter.
Born into Hirano Shoten, a kimono shop founded in 1895, she grew up surrounded by kimono. Since marrying into a couture house founded in 1966, she has devoted herself to each client at the salon, building trust over many years. She travels to Europe herself to select the finest fabrics.
An eye raised in a kimono house, and an eye for European fabrics. As the bridge between two houses, she shapes the choice of kimono and the world of Maison Brijean.
She studied couture pattern-making and tailoring at ESMOD in Paris, and haute couture embroidery at École Lesage. After returning to Japan, she honed her craft under her grandmother, who founded the salon in 1966, and for some twenty years has tailored clothing for each individual client at the Himeji salon. She creates couture that draws out the full beauty of kimono.