Issey Miyake Pleats Please Grainy Colors Skirt

Grainy Colors names what horizontal pleating does to a colour. Running the folds across the body rather than down it breaks the surface into many small horizontal bands, each catching light at a slightly different angle, so a single dye reads as a granular, mottled field rather than as a solid block. On mint green, a pale and easily flattened colour, that is transformative: instead of a flat pastel you get a surface with grain and depth. Practically the skirt is well resolved too, with side buttons, an elastic waist, and side pockets, which is more hardware than a pleated garment usually carries and each piece of it has to be placed so the pleating runs cleanly around it.

Horizontal pleating turns a pale colour into a textured one, and this skirt has the fastenings and pockets to be genuinely practical as well.

Using a fold direction to alter how a colour reads is characteristic of Issey Miyake's studio, which has always treated colour as a property of surface rather than of dye alone.

100% polyester, made in Japan, in Mint Green. Horizontally pleated, with side buttons, an elastic waist, and side pockets.

Horizontal pleating opens outward, so the skirt is fuller in motion than at rest. The elastic waist and side buttons mean it can be adjusted at the top rather than pulled on blind.

Mint green with grain in it is far easier to wear than a flat mint would be, and it sits well against grey, cream, navy, and black. Keep the top half plain.

The pleats are heat-set into the polyester and are permanent, so it washes without losing them. Wash at 30°C or below in a laundry net on a short cycle, or press gently by hand, and never tumble dry, iron, steam, or dry clean. Store it rolled along the direction of the pleats. Our fabric care guide covers polyester and technical cloth.

The Thicker Bottoms Skirt is a vertically pleated skirt with pockets, and the Thicker Bottom 2 is horizontal pleating on a trouser. Everything we carry from Issey Miyake is listed together.