#SellenatelaFindsInspirationInspiration
If you've been following Sellenatela's Instagram, you may have seen the hashtag above, where you can find inspiration.
As mentioned several times in the web content "STORIES", designer Enomoto at Sellenatela creates shoes inspired by art, design, architecture, and the shapes woven by nature. I created the hashtag #SellenatelaFindsInspirationIn because I want to share with everyone through Instagram the works that caught my heart in Enomoto's daily life.
Enomoto was familiar with art and design even before he started working as a designer at Sellenatela. In this STORIES, she takes up the brush and traces her roots while touching her own background.
“Graphical” and “constructive” are words I often use to describe the shoes I design. I am currently working as a shoe designer, but when I was a student, I wanted to be a graphic designer. I have been interested in "expressing" since I was a child, and in the future I would like to do a job that uses my sensibility.
My original experience was holding a fashion show with a friend who wanted to be a fashion designer at the school festival in my third year of high school. Starting with deciding on the overall theme of the show, we are responsible for everything from deciding the theme and concept to realizing the project, including the main visuals, posters, staff T-shirt production, opening act choreography and BGM creation, and venue decoration. It was a great experience to go to
Become a graphic designer in the future! Among forms of expression, I was particularly drawn to the joy of creating things that appeal to the senses, such as making main visuals and posters. When I was in the third and fourth grades, I belonged to a graphic design laboratory, where I mainly learned design for paper media such as posters and CD jackets. In our laboratory, we often use our own drawings for design, and I spend my days worrying about my lack of talent as a painter. I didn't know the boundary between art and design, and it was an anguish because I pursued self-expression.
Portfolio/Works from my third year at university Left: Poster for environmental issues Right: Poster for photographer Makoto Shiina
I wondered if I should go out into the world like this... I wanted to see more of the world... Feeling frustrated, I went to San Francisco for a homestay during my spring break. Today, the city is famous for its technology, where Twitter and Uber are headquartered, but 17 years ago it was known as a culturally diverse city with beatniks, hippies, and LGBT people. I vividly remember being shocked by the fact that there were so few unique people. I wanted to put myself in such an environment, so after graduating, I decided to study abroad in San Francisco.
Alamo Square & Painted Ladies
The Park "Alamo Square" behind the apartment where Enomoto lived and the Victorian House "Painted Ladies"
While studying abroad, I enrolled in the graduate school of the Department of Design at San Francisco State University, where I mainly studied visual communication. At university in the United States, there were a lot of assignments, presentations, and group work. And I was taught that there are users and audiences ahead of design, not self-expression as an artist. I was able to acquire the perspective of how to express what to whom in the constraints.
For my graduation thesis/production at graduate school, I focused on "visual communication and happiness," and researched whether visual communication can provide trivial happiness. Choosing a grand theme was a series of anguish, but I never gave up until the end, and it gave me confidence, which is what supports me today.
Through my study abroad experience, I realized that I wanted to do "work that gives shape to ideas" rather than "work that uses my sensibilities."
A year after I moved to the United States, my older sister, who lives in Japan, launched a shoe brand, and I started helping out, which led me to enter the world of shoes. In "work that gives shape to ideas", there are always "people" ahead of those who design. I am making shoes with the desire to deliver products with stories born from small brands to those people, rather than mass production.
I learned a lot from San Francisco, a city that values diversity. To coexist without excluding different things. To cherish “you” and accept “other than yourself” without being bound by race, nationality, gender, hobbies, tastes, or other things. The reason why my sources of inspiration are so diverse, from art and design to architecture and fashion and culture, is that I learned the importance of looking at things without being bound by genre in the city of San Francisco. The sense I cultivated during my time studying abroad has become the cornerstone of my current brand management.
Things that are dignified and beautiful, things that make you feel surprised and fresh, things that make you feel unique. In my daily life, various things that touch my heartstrings and give me inspiration turn into new ideas.
I hope that I can continue to cherish inspiration, give form to ideas that come to my mind, and share them with everyone. Also, it would be great if it could be an inspiration for someone and trigger the circulation of ideas and energy.
