Filthy Rich: visvim’s Mud-Dye Obsession.

Fashion, at its glossiest, usually wants to scrub the dirt away. Visvim, on the other hand, has spent more than a decade rolling up its trousers and wading straight into it. Hiroki Nakamura’s label has made an unlikely muse out of dorozome, a 1,300-year-old mud-dyeing tradition from Amami Ōshima, Kagoshima - where volcanic soil and the tannin-rich bark of the sharinbai tree conspire to turn fabrics into deep, lustrous shades of brown and black.

The recipe is simple but stubborn. Craftspeople boil down sharinbai wood until it releases its tannins, soak fabrics in this earthy tea, and then plunge them into iron-heavy mud fields where a chemical reaction fixes the colour. Repeat the ritual - over and over - until the cloth is stained not just in hue but in history. By the end, a jacket carries the weight of the landscape itself: volcanic minerals, plant matter, and the stubborn labour of artisans who have been doing this for generations.

Where visvim veers cheekily from tradition is in its choice of canvas. Historically, dorozome was reserved for silks like Oshimatsumugi, kimono textiles coveted for their elegance. Nakamura, never one to leave well enough alone, dunks modern synthetics - nylon, polyester, performance fabrics - into the mud. The effect is heresy in a kimono workshop but genius on a shop floor: a fusion of the industrial and the organic, where even the most uniform fibre comes back mottled, streaked, and alive.

Of course, imperfection is the point. Most dye houses chase flat consistency; visvim hunts for irregularity. A patchy chore coat or streaked bomber isn’t a flaw, it’s a narrative - evidence of the mud field, the water source, the brush-strokes of the artisan. It’s also a sly counterpoint to our algorithmic age, where colourways are computer-matched to the millimetre. Here, the shade shifts with each dip, as stubbornly unpredictable as the weather.

The process is also gruellingly analogue. Garments are soaked by hand in waist-deep pits, scrubbed with tawashi brushes to remove excess silt, and left to dry under Amami skies. Machine washing is forbidden - too brutal, too impersonal. Each cycle adds layers of depth, making the piece not just darker but denser with character. One chore jacket might undergo dozens of rounds before it’s deemed ready. The result is clothing that feels less like it rolled off a production line and more like it crawled out of the earth.

And because visvim never does things by halves, this muddy romance is now a three-pronged project: Harmonious Process - part scholarly publication, part Tokyo exhibition, part capsule collection. Together, they function like a dissertation in fabric form: documenting the tradition, showcasing the craft, and then cheekily retooling it for a global audience. Think of it as an academic paper, only one you can wear.

There’s a sly paradox in play: what looks, at first glance, like a field-stained jacket is actually the height of artisanal luxury. Mud, once a sign of labour, poverty, or mess, becomes a luxury finish. It’s the same cultural flip that turned ripped jeans into status symbols or "distressed leather" into a category. Except here, the distress isn’t artificial. It’s geological.

Visvim’s mud-dye pieces don’t just mark time; they evolve with it. Natural dyes, unlike their chemical rivals, fade and shift. Over years, your jacket becomes less visvim and more you - a living document of wear, weather, and accidents. In a way, Nakamura has hacked luxury: you buy the piece once, but it keeps generating newness as it ages, no seasonal collection required.

So yes, the label sells "mud-coloured clothing." But the colour isn’t the point - the process is. It’s slow fashion at its dirtiest and most demanding. And if you think that’s a gimmick, take a look at the mud fields of Amami Ōshima: finite, fragile, and fiercely protected. This is not a marketing stunt. It’s a collaboration with geology, botany, and time itself.

In the end, visvim has achieved something rare - a luxury proposition that’s simultaneously ancient and mischievously modern. To wear it is to walk around with a reminder that not everything perfect deserves your attention, and not everything dirty needs to be cleaned. Sometimes, the richest thing you can own is a little bit of earth, permanently etched into your clothes.

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Words by AW.

Photos courtesy of visvim.