Uniqlo calls its clothing LifeWear

A new word in Paris

In April 2013 Uniqlo showed its autumn and winter collection to the press in Paris, then in New York and Tokyo.¹ The Business of Fashion reported that it was the first collection presented under the brand's newly unveiled tagline, LifeWear.² Uniqlo later confirmed the sequence: "The term 'LifeWear' was first introduced by UNIQLO globally at the launch of the 2013 fall and winter collection."³

Naoki Takizawa, then Uniqlo's design director, explained the idea as a category rather than a season. "Lifewear is the theme of our collection. But it's meant to be continued every season. Like iPhone 4, iPhone 5," he told Label Networks in April 2013.⁴ In Uniqlo's own account of the preview, he described LifeWear as the concept for the kind of clothing that makes a person say it changed their way of life.¹

From maker's slogan to customer's word

Uniqlo had a brand message before LifeWear. In autumn 2010 it ran a global campaign under the line "Made for All", with Charlize Theron and Orlando Bloom as ambassadors; the phrase meant clothing for people of any nationality, age, occupation or gender.⁵ In 2011 the company called Made for All its philosophy of clothing.⁶ Fast Retailing's corporate statement, "Changing clothes. Changing conventional wisdom. Change the world.", spoke from the same side.⁷

Both lines described what Uniqlo intended. LifeWear described what the customer gets. Uniqlo's own article on the 2013 preview makes the distinction: the earlier phrases expressed the maker's stance, and the meaning of the clothing for the people who wear it was finally condensed into the single word LifeWear.¹ Made for All did not disappear. Fast Retailing still describes a "MADE FOR ALL" ethos inside its LifeWear reporting.⁸

What the definition says

Uniqlo's current definition is short: "LifeWear is clothing designed to make everyone's life better. It is simple, high-quality, everyday clothing with a practical sense of beauty."⁹ Tadashi Yanai, Chairman, President and CEO of Fast Retailing, put the reasoning in 2019: "Today, rather than fashion clothes or dressy clothes, people want clothes that facilitate a high-quality lifestyle." And: "LifeWear is the ultimate everyday clothing."¹⁰ In 2013 the press wording was different: clothing that "promotes comfort and enriches lives".³

Fast Retailing's reporting breaks the idea into five attributes: inspired by life's needs, ingenious in detail, simple and adaptable to everyone's style, looking ahead to continuously evolve, and the highest quality made accessible to everyone.⁸ Read as a brief, the list names qualities rather than a style, a season or a target group.

The term solves a problem of classification. A company selling large volumes of affordable basics is easily filed under fast fashion. LifeWear names a different category, defined by everyday use, quality and longevity rather than by trend. Yukihiro Katsuta, Uniqlo's head of research and development, answers the fast fashion label directly in 2023: "No, actually, we are pretty slow."¹¹ In Fast Retailing's own chronology, 2013 is the year of "the launch of our new LifeWear concept and an acceleration in global expansion."⁸

One idea across every channel

Since 2013 the word has organised the brand's other moves. When Christophe Lemaire was appointed artistic director of the new Uniqlo U line and the Paris R&D Center in June 2016, Fast Retailing framed the line within "the LifeWear philosophy".¹² Lemaire described his task in the same terms: "It is a challenge and a joy for me to be part of the team designing UNIQLO LifeWear - everyday clothing that resonates with people worldwide."¹² The exhibition "The Art and Science of LifeWear" ran in Paris in September 2018 and at Somerset House in London in September 2019, and returns to Paris in October 2024 for the brand's 40th anniversary.^13,14,15

In August 2019 Uniqlo launched LifeWear Magazine, a free biannual title with a print run of one million copies, edited by Takahiro Kinoshita, formerly editor-in-chief of the Japanese magazine Popeye.¹⁶ Fast Retailing's annual and integrated reports have carried the line "LifeWear, Changing the World" on their covers.¹⁷ The fabrics that Uniqlo built into named products, from HEATTECH to AIRism, are shown as LifeWear too, as in the exhibition Toray and Uniqlo run under that name.¹⁸

LifeWear gave a retailer of basics a vocabulary of its own. It turns the absence of trend into a stated principle, links the technical fabrics to a single purpose, and lets the company describe its clothing without reference to the fashion system it competes in. Thirteen years on, the 2013 tagline still frames how Uniqlo describes itself and its clothing.