Kei Tominaga's Standing Spoons - Image courtesy of Kei Tominaga
Celebrating International Women’s Day is a bit of a thing for us. We can’t deny that Japan’s reputation for supporting its women of influence is a tad lacking, but we can at least share our thoughts on women we think deserve more attention — and March is the month to do so!
Last year, we also looked at Mother’s Day in Japan. To find out more and see other women designers we admire, revisit the post here. For 2025, we’re adding a few more designers whose commitment to craft, tradition, function, form and beauty simply excel.
Kei Tominaga & an On the Wall piece - Portrait by Tom Lewis Russell, image courtesy of Kei Tominaga
Kei Tominaga
We can’t introduce Japanese women designers without mentioning Kei Tominaga — one of our valued friends whose sculptural jewellery pieces are among our best sellers at NiMi Projects. A sculptor, traditional metalsmith and jeweller, Kei is inspired by the flexibility of sheet metals, their ability to be folded, twisted, curved and bent into architectural forms. Her minimalist aesthetic retains a gentleness and subtle warmth achieved by fine textures, the use of soft metals, and her affinity for light. In the past, Kei’s work featured at Tokyo Design Week, Tokyo Designer’s Block and Saatchi & Saatchi Tokyo. Now based in the UK, she focuses on jewellery and sculptural pieces that have garnered the attention of top publications, including The Financial Times, Elle Decoration and Monocle.
Visit our Kei Tominaga collection to see her pieces.
Hiroko Takahashi & items from the Ikea Sötrönn collection - Image courtesy of Ikea Japan via PR Times
Hiroko Takahashi
Hiroko Takahashi is best known through the brand Hirocoledge — her reinvention of the kimono into stunning contemporary wear. Takahashi’s designs highlight the beauty of traditional kimono structure with striking geometric patterns — circles, lines and curves in bold colours, primarily black and white. Her distinct use of graphics led to various collaborations, including an incredibly popular collection with Adidas that also revisited classic Japanese garment shapes for contemporary wear. Last year, she showcased her reimagining of the kimono at an installation at Designart Tokyo and notably collaborated with Ikea for Sötrönn, a vibrant collection of swirl-patterned homeware that you can still, and we think you should, get.
Visit Hiroko Takahashi's Hirocoledge site to see her kimono and other garments.
Hiroko Otake & work in collaboration with &T - Image courtesy of Designart Tokyo via PR Times
Hiroko Otake
The ephemeral beauty of nature is Hiroko Otake’s design domain. A contemporary nihonga (Japanese-style) artist and graduate of Tokyo University of Arts, Otake hones traditional Japanese techniques to evoke the fleeting nature of time in works of expressive colour and texture. Her pieces use mineral pigments, gold foil and paint to depict organic motifs in both ethereal and bold artworks. Visually contemporary, yet still traditional in nature, we’ve seen her work in fashion, interior design and more. At Designart Tokyo 2024, she teamed up with embroidery art brand &T for an installation of works that further explored the creative industry’s use of materials. Upcycled textiles and fishing net threads, combined with sensors and lights, brought to life Otake’s colourful butterflies for a tactile exhibition that reminded visitors of the often transient nature of objects.
Hiroko Otake's beautiful works can be viewed on her website.
Saki Takeshita & chairs from her Eeyo series - Image courtesy of Designart Tokyo via PR Times
Saki Takeshita
By exploring the intersection of traditional Japanese artisanship with contemporary design, Saki Takeshita has an innovative approach to her work. A graduate of Musahino Art University’s Department of Industrial, Interior and Craft Design, Takeshita focuses on transforming traditional materials in unconventional and modern ways. Her furniture and objects are always artistically compelling yet still fully functional. At Designart Tokyo 2024, she unveiled Eeyo, a series of balsa wood objects that included striking chairs dyed in vibrant ombres to create subtle geometric patterns. The dynamic visual effect was achieved by dyeing and applying heat to alter hues, a process that also enhances the wood’s natural grain texture.
Be sure to visit Saki Takeshita's website to see the details of her works up-close.
Women's work at NiMi Projects
Clockwise: Maki Baxter's Twist Vase; Takako Copeland's Daruma Card, Postalco's Snap Pad A5; Onomatopée's Baroque Pearl Earring, Buoy's Leaf Tray L; and Sukima's Star Mobile.
At NiMi Projects, we come across many creative women we admire within the industrial design industry — artisans, designers and entrepreneurs. All are modest, some even seem to purposely keep a low profile. In truth, we would like to seek out more.
Here's some of our brands that are designed by or we know have influential women helping bring them success.
Asano Mokkousho — Gardening goods
Atelier Yocto — Wood works
Buoy — Recycled marine plastic goods
Kei Tominaga — Jewellery
Maki Baxter — Ceramics
Onomatopée — Jewellery
Postalco — Stationery
Saiko Design — Washi paper Lighting
Sukima — Wood mobiles
Sunaolab — Wood works
Takako Copeland — Illustration