Kimono Flea Market ICHIROYA's News Letter No.613
The other day, I visited someone's house, for I was asked to evaluate the kimono they had. I found this advertizement flyer which was so exciting much more than vintage kimono or china they had.
It was a flyer from Daimaru Department Store where I worked for 19 years before I started Ichiroya.
World Expo makes future, Daimaru makes tomorrow
The flyer also says, `Please drop by after visiting World Expo', so it makes it clear the flyer is from 1970, when World Expo was held in Osaka.
From 1961 to 1970, Daimaru was a No.1 top company of retail business. In 1970, their top position has been taken over and Daimaru Shinsaibashi store had full-scale remodelling that year(1970), they made the south building `Daimaru Kodomo-children buiding' to get back to the top. The flyer seems to be made at that time.
I was working for Daimaru for a long time but did not know about Daimaru Kodomo kan. The name of the building was Burujon(bourgeon)
Bourgeon means `coming into bud' in French. For the future of your growing children, Bourgeon offers the best thing as the first department for Children in Japan.
I was too excited and made the flyer full of wrinkles but I hope you can see the details.
Each floor of Bourgeon were named as `Mommy town' `Baby town' `Kiddy town' `Play town' and so on-most of the floor are for children.
They had railway model by Marklin, West Germany, LEGO, and other toys and also children's clothing-Tom Sawyer? Is it a brand from USA? I don't know.
The other side of the flyer shows the special sale-it is surprising, kimono is taking such a big space! When I was working for Daimaru, Kimono had only a very small corner of the whole leaflet.
Here, I can see the type of kimono my mother was wearing. My mother came to my school wearing a kimono and haori just like these on Parents' Day. Those are bargain goods but still they seem to be quite cheap.(the value of money can be considered to be 1/5 compared to present value).
Those days seemed to be filled with dreams of bright future. Everyone had pure dream of better life. What a sweet time it was-I wonder if we can be like that again.