…even this disposable aluminum pan! I wanted to buy it just for the design, but I didn’t need it.  Sounds like someone is finally learning the difference between wanting and needing something. #growingup

I found my two-year-old thesis, and felt like it was digital buried treasure. In short, it is about my family. In long, it is about me and how everything I’ve learned and absorbed growing up, beginning in this house, has allowed me to be where I am today, far from home in New York. Removed from this safe space–the island I grew up, the homes I was raised in and the people that support me–I figured something out. I figured out that I should record my past and remember things I might have forgotten. Every story has a beginning and this is definitely mine.

Kidding. We don’t really live in those, but if it was the only option, I would take it.

In a random order these are the things that happened in May. A month that was mostly spent on Maui with family and friends over a lot of delicious food. There’s a lot to say but I will just let the photos speak for themselves. Make up your own story, sometimes that’s fun too.

There’s nothing that starts a “welcome home” better than walking on to an airplane, hearing Hawaiian music and sitting in the purple throne that is going to actually take you home. As you sit and wait, people are talking and it’s pidgin. A broken up English that is a foreign language to some that you actually understand, that’s home. Seeing people you don’t even know but just look familiar because you know where they are from, that’s home too.  I took this picture today and I have taken it many many times in the past. It’s like seeing your best friend again after a long trip away.

Even after a long sleepless night, nothing warms my heart more than going to the one place that is my home, Hawaii. On my 10+ hour journey there’s a lot of time for sleep, sitting, and thinking. After a few weeks of being extremely busy doing who knows what, getting on the plane and heading home seemed so easy. I could instantly connect back to where I am from by taking myself there, something that isn’t so easy while I am away.

What is important to me between the actual trips home is the constant connection to home. Whether that means waking up and listening to local jams, keeping all of my desktop wallpapers on my computers different photos of Hawaii, or never changing my wrist watch to be in the right east coast time zone, I make an effort to be connected to home. This conscious effort is intentional because while being so far away I never want to lose that part of me. At times, living in New York could turn me into a completely different person. I can see how I can easily forget my roots, plant new ones, and probably never go home. But that’s not what I want.

For now I am away and my daily habits, communicating with my friends and family, and this plane are my connection to home. They are my lifeline. They keep me in the loop while I’m away. Today made me realize how easy it is to go home but it also made me realize why I am away. I’m gone to feel  that feeling. The one that made me so happy to see this plane, hear the Hawaiian music and see people I don’t even know speaking a language i actually understood. Being away makes everything that is ordinary, extraordinary and that is the best “welcome home” I could have ever imagined.

People, they all look the same but on the inside they are different.

Only nine with a refined mind.

Every Monday at Matsumoto Studio is #matsumotomonday. A day that we take time on the blog to share a family story, something about ourselves or anything behind the scenes. When we started blogging daily, we had to figure out what we were going to talk about then if anyone was actually going to care. We realized it didn’t matter if we had 100 hits or zero. What did matter is that we used the blog to tell our story and remind ourselves where our ideas for Matsumoto Studio are rooted and that’s our family. Looking at what inspires us and how our designs have evolved we see a lot of Hawaii and a lot of history. We take what we know best, our culture and our heritage, and turn them into something we can share with everyone else. We hope that people are not getting tired of seeing these old family photos, because they are really what make up what we are today.

Today’s post is a photo from I’m guessing, 1991. Boy’s Day, when we actually all looked like boys. Jes had a bowl cut and I was in an army uniform—like what. I love these old photos  because a lot these memories, I don’t remember. These were the years that we lived in our first house upcountry. A lot of times, this also seems like a big blur. Pictures like this help to solidify the memory. They make it real again and make it fact that my siblings did indeed put me in that army uniform and wished my name was Justin.

I started realizing the impact of my family upbringing and how it affected my work as an artist and design while I was in college–away from home. Since then it has been fueling my ideas and dreams for what I create. Everything I thought didn’t really matter is starting to matter most. I imagine the rest of my career as an artist and designer will be driven by the appreciation and celebration of my home and culture. One day it will go full circle,  I will return back home to my roots and we’ll have Matsumoto everydays. Until then look forward to more throwbacks of three happy fat kids with bad hair cuts.