On May 18, the setting was over-the-top for a New York fur show: a high-strung audience of fashion editors, actresses, government dignitaries and retail buyers swarmed into a sweltering hot room, squabbling for seats around the runway like children playing a game of musical chairs; many remained standing. Tempers flared; programs swatted the air to stir it; patience was a memory. Finally, it started. And the effect was like an air conditioner turned on from a distance. Slowly a cooling relief bathed the audience from the general direction of the runway's blistering lights.

To those in the audience who were not of Japanese heritage, the eye had to adjust. We felt the effect of a different color palette before we embraced the style of designer Chie Imai. Her pale mink in shades of pink, yellow, blue and/or peach with white worked into mosaic patterns produced a calm like walking in a Japanese garden.

This was Chie Imai's first presentation of her collection -- called Royal Chie -- anywhere outside of Japan. Important Japanese New Yorkers paid homage, including the Japanese ambassador to the U.S., plus 150 media representatives.

At first glance, her signature "Mosaique de Chie," a pattern and fur-working technique she invented 22 years ago, could remind the fur connoisseur of work by a famous Canadian designer. But as the show continued, Chie's unique vision became obvious.

Each season she chooses an inspirational theme for her collection; this year it is Cherry Blossoms, the Japanese spring flower. Her execution could not have been more effective, even if she were to become literal and send out a whole fistful of coats with flower patterns cut into them. Instead, her light hand in blending small dots of color with small dots of white, together shading light to dark in different areas of the garment, seems inspired as much by the art of pointillism as by Chie's favored Italian designer, Missoni.

But in fact, Missoni is where it all began. On one of Chie's travels to Italy, she admired the house's colorful artistry and wondered why she didn't see such excitement in fur fashion. With no background in fur-making and no fashion training, she simply developed her Mosaique de Chie and scoured the world for a company capable of producing it. She ended up in Europe, and today much of her manufacturing is done in Finland.

With a steely drive to succeed, Chie built her company's sales and image into the stratosphere. Now an acclaimed celebrity herself in Japan, she caters to the rich and famous, including Japanese royal families. She enjoys the atmosphere of the world-renowned Imperial Hotel in Tokyo as the setting for her flagship store, and her furs are carried by some 200 other retailers. Last year Royal Chie's sales reached close to fifty million dollars.

In fact, Royal Chie furs are in such demand in Japan that, after the collection debuts each May, the year's entire production of 3,000 pieces is sold out by July. She has never once sold a garment at a discounted, "sale" price.

This year, Chie set another challenge for herself: expanding her brand outside of Japan. The United States was her first choice, for sentimental as well as practical business reasons.

First, she said through an interpreter, "I like the U.S. very much. My grandfather came here 100 years ago, and my father was born in the U.S. I was born in Japan, but as a little girl, my grandfather talked about the U.S. very much, and I always dreamed about coming here. So I was very proud to have a fashion show in New York."

Second, many of her Japanese clients travel to the U.S. regularly and find it cheaper to purchase Royal Chie furs here than in Japan.

This summer, Royal Chie designs are in the process of being snapped up by various fine fur and specialty stores throughout the United States for the first time, readying for consumers this fall. Ever the strategist, Chie is choosing only one store per city, and only those stores willing to develop "mini boutiques" of her furs, in order to display a representation of her collection instead of just a few pieces, which would look odd indeed in the dark-mink setting of most fur salons.

Chie is already eyeing her own Madison Avenue boutique in a couple of years and eventually an expansion into other countries around the world.

But for now, Royal Chie furs must find a home in the U.S. This doesn't seem an insurmountable challenge: not only do her magical colors make Chie's designs distinctive from most of today's fur styles. Chie's minks are lightweight, many are reversible, and they are designed for travel, to roll up into a handbag (perhaps a leather one designed by Chie also). Shapes are roomy and can fit a size six to twelve.