Discussing the Content and Intent of the 5th New Luxury Course

We have begun accepting applications for the 5th New Luxury Course, which will start in January 2025, as follows.

In this regard, I would like to write about the intent of this program.

Workshop assignments and the expansion of participants' areas of interest

For the workshop assignment, participants are asked to identify three contacts for introducing their own material—whether hard or soft—in Europe or elsewhere, and present this on the final day. This point remains the same as last time.

When we talk about introducing materials, people tend to think only of exports. However, it is also fine to look at it from the perspective of, 'What kind of people do we want to attract from Europe?' for tourism businesses within Japan.

In fact, as we have progressed from the 2nd to the 3rd and 4th terms, the number of participants involved in tourism has increased. Furthermore, not only those working exclusively in tourism, but also those who are adding, or wish to add, an 'experience' element to their current business have begun to participate.

From what perspective did we ask the guest lecturers to participate?

Given that, the program concept requires that the organizers always keep the region where business is conducted in view and be able to engage in discussions sensitive to the local context. Moreover, it is desirable for them to speak about the combination of local and craft as a form.

This is because craft often involves local cultural identity, and I would be grateful if they could speak about this point from the perspectives of both an insider and an outsider.

The following individuals are at the very heart of these themes: Tadashi Matsuba of Gungendo in Iwami Ginzan, Shimane Prefecture, Hiroyuki Murase and Ayaka Inoue of Suzusan in Arimatsu Shibori, Nagoya, and Daisuke Yamazaki of Motherhouse, which has production bases in Asian countries such as Bangladesh. Not only Gungendo, which handles clothing and has expanded into the lodging business, but Suzusan is also gradually adding experience-based areas to its retail business.

In addition to these lecturers, Yukako Saito, an expert in gastronomy tourism who lives in Alba, Piedmont will talk about how to view 'Washoku' (Japanese cuisine) as a case study for balancing the local and the universal. In other words, we are using Washoku to represent another form of local and craft.

And for our first guest lecturer, we invited Kohei Aoki of Kurashicom, which operates 'Hokuoh, Kurashi no Doguten' (Nordic, Living Tools Store). As a prerequisite for narrowing down the theme to local and craft, I thought that Mr. Aoki's entrepreneurial art theory would be effective as a perspective or stance for grasping both logical and non-logical aspects. His entrepreneurial art theory is based on artist Takashi Murakami's 'Art Entrepreneurship Theory,' but it is something entirely different as a theory of entrepreneurship.

The above is the intent of the program.

Programs linked to this course

Furthermore, I am trying not to view the New Luxury Course in isolation, but to combine it with programs that offer multiple perspectives. The following explains the general framework.

To introduce them individually, the first is an introductory course on Meaning Innovation to be held on December 14, planned by Hatarakikata Radio. Meaning Innovation is a required subject for understanding the changes in the meaning of luxury.

The other is a training program titled 'Learning the Intersection of Design and Business in Italy,' set in the territory of the Langhe region of Piedmont. We held an experimental version at the end of this September, and we will hold the official version at the end of May next year. Therefore, we will hold an event on December 9 to report on the results and discuss our plans for next year.

The reason I am introducing these two programs as well is not to invite you to participate in all of them. Rather, it is a suggestion that it is good to approach things with about three perspectives.

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The photo at the beginning is a corner of an agriturismo in Alba. Wine barrels are used as benches. From here, you can look out over the vineyards that spread out across the landscape.