Official
There is a history on the Mitsukoshi mark
The Mitsukoshi mark is often seen when walking around Nihonbashi or Ginza.
Did you know that the auspicious numbers are hidden in the word "Koshi" in the circle?
In fact, it is drawn with fainting so that the hitting point of the brush and the jumping point are Shichigosan.
After knowing this, every time I saw the Mitsukoshi mark, I began to observe the faint part.
In the Edo period, "Maru ni girder three"
By the way, do you know when the Mitsukoshi mark became "Maruni Koshi" as it is now?
In the Nishiki-e of the Edo period, the storefront of Mitsui Echigoya, which was located in Surugacho, Nihonbashi, is covered with a Japanese shop curtain of "Maruni Igirder Three".
Hiroshige "Toto Famous Place Surugamachinozu" (reprinted from the Digital Collection of the National Diet Library)
This mark is said to have been established by Takatoshi Mitsui, the founder of Mitsui.
Originally, the Mitsui family, who was the samurai, had the same family crest as Genji Oomi and Hexagon Sasaki, as the family crest, and when the Echigoya opened, they used the "Yotsu Meki" as it was. It is said that the store badge was changed to "Maruni Igirder San".
To "go to Maru" in Meiji period
It was the Meiji Restoration that the store badge of Mitsui Echigoya changed to "Maruni Koshi".
Echigo-ya, which had deteriorated due to the turbulence of late Tokugawa shogunate, will be formally separated from Mitsui, which aims to establish a bank. At that time, we decided to abolish the store badge of "Maruni Igirder San", which we used in the past, and use the store badge of "Maruni Koshi". It was in 1872.
Yoshitora Mosai, "Masayuki Mitsui, Suruga-cho, Tokyo" (reprinted from the Digital Collection of the National Diet Library)
This Kaikae painting depicts the current location of the Nihonbashi Mitsukoshi Main Store and the Mitsui Main Building, and was published in 1874.
The two-story building in the foreground is both "Maruni Koshi" Japanese shop curtain.
The three-story pseudo-Western-style building in the back is Suruga-cho Taika Bank Mitsui Gumi House, the predecessor of Mitsui Bank. The results of the selection and concentration of management resources carried out to launch Japan's first private bank can be read from a single picture, which is very interesting.
Mitsukoshi then returned the store emblem from "Maru to Koshi" to "Maru to Igiji San" in 1896, but eight years later, in Meiji 37 (1904), "Maru to Koshi" again.
This year was a year when Mitsukoshi made a "Department Store Declaration" and strongly showed both inside and outside the country that it would survive as a department store, not a kimono store.