Finding the balance
Caroline Xue, managing director of MARJA KURKI Fashion (Beijing) Co. Ltd, which specializes in customized scarf design, explained that one of the reasons many Net users make fun of these "Chinese-style" designs is that they might consider them "too cartoonish and too childish" for brands targeting mature consumers.
"It shouldn't be a simple work of stacking, listing, or accumulating," Xue said, adding that the key to good Chinese-style designs lies in finding the balance.
She led a design team in creating gift scarves for the Palace Museum in 2008. The scarves were to cater to both domestic and foreign customers, so the assignment, which required that the designs show the museum's characteristics and be beautiful to wear, was not easy, Xue said.
"When one is required to present Chinese elements, it's especially delicate for the designer to know the balance," she said. "The principle is not to overly please the consumers."
She said that a designer must take several things into consideration and that using Chinese elements alone is not enough.
In the first stage, the team collected a lot of elements and images for inspiration, Xue said. "[But] we didn't just plainly put elements on the scarves, which will be like a lame advertisement."
Aside from color combinations and how their designs will look against the skin, Xue said some amount of weight must be given to the meaning and purpose behind what is being designed.
She said her team had heated discussions about what to do for the upcoming Year of the Monkey.
"The idea of using a monkey on the scarves was rejected by every Chinese member of the team, and they said it might end up in having stocks that will not sell for years," she said. "Monkeys are not as lucky in Chinese culture. They are naughty and not as desirable as horses or dragons."
Xue suggested international brands listen more to their local Chinese teams who better know local consumers' psychology. "[Foreigners] might overexert themselves," she said. "[They] might use beautiful things but they can't just assume Chinese people love the most traditional things. Nobody is wearing a qipao (cheongsam) or magua (mandarin jacket worn over a gown)."
A clever way would be combining the modern and the traditional, the Western and the Chinese, said Xue. "There must be alteration. I think [the international brands] know all about it, but their problem is that they are so eager to cater to the Chinese market that they forget to properly listen to the local team."
A foreigner's point of view
Nels Frye, former editor-in-chief of the Beijing-based Lifestyle Magazine, and head of stylites.net, a fashion platform for creative consultancy, told Metropolitan that he notices a lot of foreign brands are doing "the Chinese New Year gimmick."
"It seems like they (the designs that Net users make fun of) are a little bit too cartoonish, with the monkeys that are slightly grotesque," he said. "It might get a little bit tiresome for people, but it is still an okay sales & marketing strategy."
On some level, the brands want to show they are friendly to Chinese customers, and sensitive to their traditions, he said. However, Chinese style in fashion is far more than using Chinese zodiac signs in special edition designs.
"I think the brands that I like are a little more understated in what they think is Chinese. But most importantly, they are more innovative in materials and cuts that are new but also clearly have traditional inspiration," Frye said.
With years of experience working with both foreign and Chinese designers, Frye has found a lot of good designers of Chinese styles in Beijing.
They include BIFU by Xing Chen, a design brand based in Qianmen area, Dongcheng district, and Rechenberg, founded based on German-born designer Kathrin von Rechenberg's signature fabric "tea-silk" that dates back to the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).
Compared to the more obvious Chinese elements, Frye prefers things that are more subtle, brands that use Chinese cultural "influences" rather than colors or patterns. Although Frye thinks foreigners might tend to like more obvious elements, such as dragons and cheongsam, he rejects the idea of categorizing the differences between Chinese and foreigners based on how they appreciate and interpret the Chinese style. For him, the differences usually go back to different levels of sophistication and whether they have international outlooks.
He gave the fashion brand NE-Tiger and designer Guo Pei as examples, and said both are "extremely in-your-face and overwhelming Chinese style" but are very successful and popular among Chinese customers. "Both foreigners and Chinese have created brands that are perhaps a little bit more attractive, subtle, and nuanced, in their way of interpreting Chinese style," he said.
