A-POC ABLE ISSEY MIYAKE x JAXA Turn Satellite Shots of Antarctic Ice Into “TYPE-XVII” Jeans
Each pair is woven from one continuous piece of jacquard cloth, so the ice and sea live inside the fabric instead of printed on top.
by Sophie Caraan · HypebeastSummary
A-POC ABLE ISSEY MIYAKE has teamed up with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency on new jeans under its “TYPE-XVII JAXA project”
The design pulls from Antarctic observation images captured by JAXA’s climate change monitoring satellite “SHIKISAI”
Wide and straight silhouettes are offered, each made with the label’s in-house single-cloth jacquard technique
A-POC ABLE ISSEY MIYAKE is taking its textile engineering into orbit with the “TYPE-XVII JAXA project” jeans, a collaboration with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). Instead of printing an image onto finished fabric, the pair translates satellite data of Earth directly into the weave, with Antarctica serving as the design’s focal point.
The source material comes from “SHIKISAI,” the JAXA satellite tasked with observing climate change from above. Its images of the southern continent supply the entire visual language here: sweeping fields of white ice interrupted by fissures where dark navy ocean shows through. The result reads less like a graphic and more like a topographic surface you can wear.
Construction is where the project earns its spec-sheet credibility. A-POC ABLE ISSEY MIYAKE renders the imagery through its proprietary jacquard, building each pair from one continuous piece of cloth so the Antarctic pattern lives inside the textile rather than sitting on top of it. That approach lets the contrast between ice and sea carry through the garment as part of its structure.
Two silhouettes anchor the drop. A wide jean offers a roomier, relaxed leg, while a straight version keeps a cleaner line, and both arrive in a run of four sizes so the satellite-derived pattern can scale across different builds.
The A-POC ABLE ISSEY MIYAKE x JAXA “TYPE-XVII JAXA project” jeans drop November 1 via A-POC ABLE ISSEY MIYAKE / AOYAMA, A-POC ABLE ISSEY MIYAKE / KYOTO and ISSEY MIYAKE GINZA / 442.