http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/29/fashion/the-japan-store-paris-isetan-mitsukoshi-group.html 2016-09-28 17:19:33 The Japan Store, a New Ambassador to France A new boutique, stocked with imports from tea to kimonos, is a venture of Japan’s largest department store group. === PARIS — The newest Japanese ambassador to Paris sits in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower, preparing for a debut. On Tuesday morning, a man with a tape measure was making sure each tea set displayed on a center table was positioned just so. The kimonos and patchwork denim shirts had been hung. On Saturday, the Japan Store at the The French embrace of Japan is nothing new. The cultural center, which offers classes, exhibitions and films, opened in 1997; the interest in all things Japanese goes back much further (the French term So the Japan Store will enter a city already well stocked with Japanese imports and well versed in their merits. But the shop is a new venture from the Isetan Mitsukoshi Holdings, Japan’s largest department store group — its full name is the Japan Store Isetan Mitsukoshi — which believes it has something to add to the mix. “We have a huge selection of merchandise in Japan,” said Hajime Nakagawa, the general manager of overseas merchandising for Isetan Mitsukoshi. “We have the knowledge of these products.” Distilling that huge selection to what is, for the group, a very boutique space is a challenge. “In Japan, we are department stores, so quite big,” Mr. Nakagawa said, surveying his small domain. “This space is a small one.” Mitsukoshi had previously operated a department store in Paris, catering largely to Japanese tourists. For the moment, the new shop will be the group’s sole Paris location, though the company is using the store as a test for future openings. Most of the store’s selection of merchandise will be made in Japan, some of it — like Isetan and Mitsukoshi both entered the world as kimono shops — 130 years and more than 300 years ago — and on rails by the street-facing window are kimonos (670 to 800 euros, or $750 to $900) by When it opens, the store will be spotlighting its rarest and most obsessional offering, 11 custom and often handmade tea sets, with cups, canisters, measuring spoons and whisks, in cedar boxes. (The wood comes from the regularly replaced roof slats of a centuries-old Kyoto teahouse — a “national treasure,” Mr. Nakagawa said — which is the sort of thing that, after spending 20 minutes among the older-and-wiser offerings of the Japan Store, you come to expect as a given.) The 11 styles, beginning at €5,300, include traditional versions as well as those by the Irish artist Peter MacMillan, who is based in Japan. One MacMillan design comes with a clover-dotted English teacup and linens in Isetan’s own tartan; another, the most expensive on offer at €24,800, has a faux Cup Noodles made of wood. “Most Paris customers might already know about Japanese culture,” Hiroshi Ohnishi, the chief executive of Isetan Mitsukoshi, said in an email. “But we aim to let them know not only ‘Cool Japan’ products but also Japanese custom, lifestyle and omotenashi spirits” — that is, the Japanese cultural virtue of hospitality. In return, he added, “We hope that they would feel like coming to beautiful Japanese regional places.”