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To order a Meijin Karate Uniform Start Here
Belt Embroidery FREE Japanese
name translations—Guaranteed correct. Beautiful,
washable, and durable embroidery in any color. We can embroider to your precise specification on the following: Cotton belts
in red, yellow, orange, green, blue, purple, brown and black. Click here to see style examples To order a Meijin Belt Start Here
Custom Translation, Design and Embroidery Service We can create almost any design you require and embroider in in a dazzling range of colors. Please call us to discuss your requirements. 818-889-3856. (Sorry! We don't embroider other manufacturer's products). As embroidery is done in-house we can even combine characters to create new designs without the need for a setup charge. For example by combining Kokusai, Karate Do, and Renmei you create the International Karate Federation.
Price Guide for Embroidery Name Embroidery including translation into katakana script and sewing onto a uniform or belt. First name $15. First name and last name $25 Style
Embroidery from our list of standard designs New Meijin Uniforms are embroidered FREE to purchasers with either the owner's name or his/her style. When you order a new Meijin uniform from us please mention that you need this service.
A Brief History of the Karate Uniform & Belt
In the tropical climate of Okinawa, karate students often trained without tops and in the summer even pants were discarded in favor of a simple loin-cloth.Far to the north in mainland Japan with its cold winters a different solution had to be found. Uniforms based on the design from Jigoro Kano's Kodokan Judo Institute were adopted, and with them a stitched cotton belt.
Embroidery Okinawan karate was first established successfully in the Japanese Universities of Keio, Waseda, and Tokyo in the mid 1920s. Training would take place in the gymnasium where uniforms would be hung to dry after class. The picture above of Gichin Funakoshi teaching a Tokyo university class against the background of a wall covered with uniforms shows clearly why each uniform was identified with its owners name. Subscribe
to Classical Fighting Arts magazine!
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When
G. Funakoshi first went to mainland Japan to teach Okinawan karate, most Okinawan instructors were still wearing
Chinese style rank sashes tied in a bow at the left hip. Photos exist of
Choki Motobu also wearing baggy shorts for training with a black sash around
his ample waist.
By the time the first Japanese black belts were created the modern style
karate-gi (keiko-gi or do-gi) was universally used, as was the thickly stitched
belt wound twice around the waist and tied with a simple knot over the navel.