Akira Minagawa is Mina Perhonen

Last week I stopped at Kinokuniya NYC to browse the Japanese magazines they have on their newsstand.

One of Magazine House's beautiful “mooks” caught my eye right away. (A mook is a cross between a magazine and a book.)

This one is called Textbook of Beautiful Homes (美しい住まいの教科書) and presents its content as a series of chapter-by-chapter visits to the homes of famous creative people with some connection to Japan.

For example, the chef-founder of Eatrip restaurant in Harajuku.

Or the couple behind Tsubaki Tokyo botanical arrangements. 

Or textile designer Mina Perhonen. 

Hmm, Mina Perhonen, I thought, she probably has a neat house. Is it in Finland?

So I paged toward the chapter about Perhonen’s home, expecting it to be filled with the eclectic, busy, natural patterns she is famous for.

But when I got there ... Wait, what?

A Japanese man named Akira Minagawa lives in her house? 

No!

And there’s more.

Mina Perhonen is not a real person. (Neither is Mari Mekko, apparently.) 

Large lesson learned, I continued, to try to take something besides this small self-embarrassment.

So here it is … Minagawa’s house is like a small gallery where every object tells the story of his life. 

The space is elegant and spare with art capturing natural themes - birds, botanicals, butterflies - that inspire his work.

Subtle wooden furniture by Scandinavian designers, especially Finnish ones like Alvar Aalto, fit the rooms. (No surprise, given the inspiration Mina Perhonen draws from Finnish decorative arts and culture.)

Minagawa's home has none of the busily-patterned fabrics I was expecting, but the rest of it is exactly what one would experience visiting a Mina Perhonen store in Tokyo.

Special credit to Magazine House photographer Norio Kidera, who captured the scenes that make the Minagawa-Perhonen connection so well.