On June 15, Human Made announced that it is "acquiring all shares" of UNDERCOVER by 2028. This simultaneously merges two supremely famous Japanese clothing companies and demonstrates a surprising flex from an emergent industry titan. That is to say, who'd expect Human Made to become the next big Japanese fashion conglomerate?

It's worth stepping back to contextualize why exactly it's so wild that streetwear-leaning Human Made is absorbing edgy fashion darling UNDERCOVER — because it is.

Human Made is a clothing label launched by BAPE founder NIGO in 2010 that specializes in graphic-ish workwear.

Now, that's merely the simple story. Human Made has since split into Human Made, the clothing brand, and Human Made, the empire. Human Made, the clothing brand, is expanding across Asia, leveraging increased popularity into new flagships and more luxurious product. Whereas early collections focused on screen-printed basics, Human Made's latest drop ups the ante with indigo-dyed T-shirts and kakishibu -dyed work shirts.

Human Made Co., Ltd is also evolving, and it's even more ambitious than its eponymous clothing line.

In the past few years, Human Made, the company, has shown up big in many big ways.

It opened a handful of concept stores in Japan, South Korea, and Hong Kong to tap into local markets; it oversaw splashy collaborative projects with peers like Kid Cudi, artist Verdy, and Cactus Plant Flea Market; it expanded its Curry Up restaurant to include overseas locations; it hired the founder of WTAPS to oversee a cost-effective youth-culture imprint; and it brought on famous advisors like KAWS and Pharrell.

The emergent Human Made empire is built on familiar terrain like retail and real estate, but the UNDERCOVER acquisition hints at something bigger.

Whereas Human Made is a sleeping giant yet to be acknowledged — not too surprising, as many powerful Japanese fashion consortiums are barely known outside of the country — UNDERCOVER is known to all. Give or take.

Founded around the same time as BAPE in the '90s — founder Jun Takahashi cofounded pioneering Harajuku retailer Nowhere with NIGO in the early '90s — UNDERCOVER received the early blessing of COMME des GARÇONS founder Rei Kawakubo and quickly transitioned from punkish streetwear into a staple of the Paris catwalks. To this day, it remains well-loved by critics, if perhaps less vital than it once was.

To put it in context, this purchase is sort of like if Supreme bought Marc Jacobs.

The Human Made brand exists in a comfort zone of saleable casual clothing whereas UNDERCOVER, admittedly adept at fashion's commercial concerns, is considered more of a "fashion" operation. They're aligned but separate.

Their shared history justifies the acquisition enough that it's directly mentioned in Human Made's press release but the bigger takeaway is that Human Made seems to be refashioning itself as a proper multi-label conglomerate, one big enough to absorb likeminded brands of different stripes. To put it another way, could Human Made be the next COMME des GARÇONS?

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