From Gravure Dreams to a Near Suicide Attempt: The Turbulent Life of Former Pichi Lemon Model Hiroko Kamata

Admiring gravure idols: “I wanted to pose nude as soon as possible!”

Gravure idol Kamata Hiroko, known as Kamuchin, who has over 400,000 total followers, also has the face of a business owner—running the bar 【bar and merry.】 in  Shimokitazawa and selling her own retort curry brand 【Kamuchin Curry】 that she developed herself. Kamuchin, who is active in multiple fields, first entered the public eye as an exclusive model for the magazine Pichi Lemon.

“I was scouted while walking around my hometown in Kanagawa. The agency had many fashion-type models—several exclusive models for Nicola and Seventeen were signed there.”

Soon after joining the agency, she was selected as a Pichi Lemon exclusive model. Kamuchin’s career had a smooth start, but she says she didn’t have any particular longing for the entertainment industry.

“Even as an exclusive model, we only had photo shoots a few times a month, and occasionally some advertising work. I actually wanted to do gravure work instead of modeling.”

Kamuchin says she was a gravure idol otaku in junior high school. Her room walls were covered with posters of Yuko Ogura (42) and Shoko Hamada (39).

“I often bought gravure magazines too. Back then, gravure idols felt more like true entertainers than they do now. With fashion models, the clothes are the main star—so I always felt like I was just playing a supporting role.

But gravure idols, even in a swimsuit, their own bodies are the main star. They could fight with just themselves. I thought that was so cool, and I always admired them.”

Wanting desperately to become a gravure idol, she asked her agency directly, but they rejected her, saying, “We can’t really do that at our company.” So Kamuchin decided to switch agencies.

“I went to interview at an agency where one of my favorite gravure idols belonged. Right after that, I went to show my face to the staff of Rank Oukoku (TBS). They hired me on the spot as the 8th MC.”

As soon as she changed agencies, she landed a position as an MC on a terrestrial TV show — an enviably smooth start — but ironically, getting such a big role “ended up restricting the kind of gravure work I could do”, she says with a wry smile.

“I wanted to do gravure that was really on the edge — what people call ‘chakuiro’ (almost nude-style gravure) — but the show’s policy was more like, ‘Healthy gravure is okay’, It’s a luxury problem, but I was constantly frustrated like, ‘I want to take it off, but I can’t!’ (laughs).”

When her MC job wrapped up, she once again left her agency and finally began the gravure career she’d always dreamed of.

“I was like, ‘I can finally take it off!’ It was emotional. Releasing DVDs, publishing photo books — it was so much fun!! I love aiming for that borderline between visible or not visible. The fact that it’s almost too erotic just made it all the more enjoyable.”

Opening a bar during the pandemic, diving into curry development

I myself did gravure a long time ago, but I hated heke-ero–style shoots so much that I once ran away from a set, and when they tried to make me wear an extreme outfit that wasn’t in the meeting notes, I even slit my wrist. I have far more bad memories than good ones.

But Camchin says firmly, “There was nothing about gravure that I hated.”

“I often hear stories from gravure idols who had awful experiences during shoots. But in my case, I wanted to do gravure, so there was nothing I disliked. I chose the extreme outfits myself. I even asked the publishing company to let me do the retouching, so they never used weird-looking photos of me.”

Although she had no problems within the gravure world, after going freelance in 2012 she says she struggled with fans who turned into stalkers.

“I published photo books as doujinshi, and I organized my own photo sessions and events. But one fan posted photos taken near my home on social media without permission, and someone put trash in my mailbox. After one event, I was followed home, and the moment I opened my apartment door, he tried to slip inside with me. If I had closed the door 0.1 seconds later, who knows what would’ve happened.”

She immediately called the police, but the fan had already run off. Fortunately, there were no further incidents. Even so, she didn’t let the stalking scare her off, and she continued her gravure career. Around the same time, she also started performing with a band.

She was able to support herself without part-time work solely through entertainment, but eventually decided to establish her own company, thinking, “It’s better to have staff than to work alone.”

The location for this interview, bar and merry., was apparently opened simply because one of her staff said, “I want to do something in the food-and-drink business.”

“Then I was like, ‘Okay, let’s do it,’ kind of on that vibe (laughs). The day after we talked about it, I was already looking for a place. Just as we were about to open, the pandemic hit, and opening got delayed by two months—but somehow, we made it to our fifth year this year.

If we had opened before COVID, I guess we would’ve been stressed out going, ‘Our sales dropped!’ but since we had no pre-pandemic numbers to compare to, there wasn’t much pain. As the pandemic settled down, sales kept rising that’s pretty much how it went.”

Since last summer, she also began selling her own retort curry, Camchin Curry.
“When I want to do something, I want to do it right away. I have no discipline,” she says with a bright smile.

“I’ve always loved curry, and while going around trying different restaurants and studying them, I eventually started making my own—and ended up creating what I’d call the ultimate curry. Then I thought, ‘I want other people to try it too.’”

It was in April of this year that Kamuchin, who had been living what could only be described as an extremely smooth-sailing life, shocked the internet with a suicide-attempt incident.

“I was drinking alone from the afternoon and I started wanting to go to another world. Since I was a teenager, I’ve always had a faint sense of wish for death. It’s hard to explain properly, but it wasn’t I want to die, it was more like I want to go somewhere else.”

While getting completely drunk and watching a classic anime, Kamuchin started to feel that I can go to another world, maybe that world is closer to me. When she woke up, she was in a hospital bed.

“I had been sending LINE messages to a friend while drunk. That friend rushed over to my apartment and called an ambulance.”

She was taken to the hospital in the middle of the night and discharged the next day. She had gotten a huge bump on her head during the suicide attempt, but after a CT scan, there were no abnormalities in her brain. When Kamuchin posted the details on social media, she received a flood of replies saying, “What are you doing?” “Value your life,” “Think of your family.”

“When I looked at the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare’s website, it said, ‘You must not lecture someone who has attempted suicide,’ ‘You must not question the value of life,’ and I understood why. The person involved already knows all those righteous things without being told. Shallow lectures don’t reach them.

It was tough, but I think learning that was meaningful. If anyone around you is like me, I want people to know: ‘Don’t tell them all sorts of things.’”

Now she has completely calmed down, and Kamuchin smiled, saying, “I’m glad to be alive.” Her natural vitality has returned as well.

“Recently I started YouTube, and it feels like an adult club activity—it’s fun. I really want lots of people to watch it. And at the beginning of next year, I’m going to hold a circuit event in Shimokitazawa called Kamuchin Curry Fes, so I want to make that a success.”

Gravure idol, company president, bar owner, curry creator, YouTuber.
Kamuchin, who has countless faces, smiled and said, “From now on too, I’ll just do whatever I want to do, whenever I want to do it.”