Kitsune Fox Kimono Jacket 'Shirogitsune'

A white fox mask hanging from a cloud, on black fading to red

The mask is what you see first, and it is meant to be. A white kitsune mask hangs at the centre of the back, its eyes and cheeks marked in red, suspended by a green cord from a curling white cloud above it. Behind it, a red sun. Around it, the ground changes as it falls: black at the shoulders, netted with a fine red lattice, then red at the hem, scattered with cherry blossom in pink and white, with black horizontal bars and a single blue one running across like the beams of a fence. The front edge is a flat band of black, and the fronts carry the same lattice, the same fade, and more blossom.

It is a festival jacket, the mask being the one sold at the stalls outside a shrine on a summer night, and the print has the flat, graphic look of a poster for one. Nothing in it is shaded. Everything is drawn.

The name, Shirogitsune, means white fox, the messenger of Inari, the god of rice and of merchants, whose shrines are the ones with the tunnels of red gates. The fox mask is the one worn at the festivals held for that god, and the red of the hem is the red of those gates.

It is printed, not embroidered, with the fade from black to red handled in the dye rather than in a seam, so there is no line where one colour stops. The cloth is a light polyester with a smooth surface and a soft drape, chosen because a red this bright must stay bright, and because a jacket for a summer night should weigh nothing. Three-quarter sleeves, open front, no fastening, hem at the hip.

At three metres it is a red-and-black jacket with a white face on the back. At thirty centimetres the lattice shows every line, the blossom shows every petal, and the mask shows the cord it hangs from. It is built to be looked at from behind, in a crowd, by lantern light.

The cut is a short open kimono jacket, relaxed through the body and easy at the shoulder. Over a white tee, the black edge and the white tee make a stripe down the middle and the red frames it. Over black, the top half of the jacket disappears into the outfit and the red hem and the mask float. It goes with black trousers, dark denim, and nothing else patterned.

It comes in one size, cut to drape with an easy fit. It is Asian sizing, so it sits closer than a Western one-size; if you are usually L or above, expect it to fit close rather than loose.