Fashion designer Kenzo Takada dies 'from Covid complications'

Fashion designer Kenzo Takada has died aged 81.

The Franco-Japanese designer was famed for his jungle-infused designs and free-spirited aesthetic that channelled his home continent of Asia.

His family said in a statement issued to French media that he had died from complications from Covid-19 in a hospital near Paris.

A spokeswoman for the company that organises press for his brand confirmed that he had died, but did not give a cause of death.

Despite retiring more than twenty years ago to pursue a career in art, Takada remains one of the most respected fixtures of high Paris fashion.

Since 1993, the brand Kenzo has been owned by French luxury goods company LVMH.

The current designer, Felipe Oliveira Baptista, unveiled Kenzo’s spring-summer 2020 collection to fashion editors on Wednesday.

"His amazing energy, kindness, talent and smile were contagious," said Baptista, paying tribute: "His kindred spirit will live forever."

Bernard Arnault, chairman and chief executive of LVMH, added: "Kenzo Takada has, from the 1970s, infused into fashion a tone of poetic lightness and sweet freedom which inspired many designers after him."

Takada was born on February 27 1939 in Himeji, Japan, to hoteliers, but after reading his sisters’ fashion magazines his love of fashion began.

Studying at the Bunka College of Fashion in Tokyo, he had a brief stint working in Japan, before relocating to Paris in 1965, to work as a freelance designer.

In Paris, he took over a boutique in 1970 and shortly rose to fame with pioneering shoulder forms, large armholes, dungarees, smock tent dresses, and innovative shoulder shapes.

He showed collections in New York and Tokyo in 1971.

His love of travel and use of ethnic influences were strong features in his three decades at his fashion house.

His contribution to style was significant, championing a youthful aesthetic and unstructured form.