Make up your own mind about what looks good

gzlaser

IN the eyes of her subordinates, she is a monster. She assigns them seemingly impossible tasks. She is also merciless, sacrificing their interests for her own. She is Miranda Priestly, the main character in the American film The Devil Wears Prada.

However, this she-devil, editor-in-chief of an American fashion magazine, does have good taste in clothes. She wears Prada only. It represents a simple but chic image, and fits Priestly's middle-aged look. It reflects a \"Less is more\" social trend of the 1990s, which calls for a simpler life in an increasingly sophisticated society.

As a fashion insider, Priestly knows the image that Prada conveys and the social message behind it. In fact, even outside the movies almost every fashion style comes with some social purpose and an intended look.

\"Clothes are product of society and a symbol of it,\" said Wu Xuekai, who once worked as the chief designer for the menswear brands FIRS and SEVEN.

\"Clothes often convey certain cultural information. One reason is designers are in a certain society and are influenced by what is in that society,\" Wu said at Beijing International Fashion Week, which runs through the end of the week.

As evidence of this, Wu points to punk and hip-hop. \"They were music styles first. As the music became popular, the ways the musicians dressed were embraced by people and became a fashion.\"

But ordinary folk, including the young, often seem oblivious to the cultural message behind what they are wearing.

Sun Xuefei is a designer and lecturer at the Beijing Institute of Clothing Technology. She once did a study in her class, where she found that, while most of the students liked hip-hop and punk styles, very few of them knew where they came from and when. \"As students of fashion design, they should know this,\" Sun said.

In Sun's view, foreign culture seems to dominate the clothing choices of young Chinese today. \"Most of my students dress in punk or hip-hop styles because the media tell them that these are popular,\" Sun said.

\"They rush out to the same shops and dress themselves up in more or less the same way: big metal 'studs' in their clothes and bags and heavy exaggerated necklaces.

\"I hardly see any Chinese element in what today's young Chinese wear,\" she added. She also says she feels a bit sad about this. \"Even my students majoring in clothing design go to the same street shops and never wear clothes they make themselves.\"

Sun maintains that young people shouldn't let themselves be so influenced by the media. Instead, they should make up their own minds about what looks good.

Zeng Fengfei, a designer with his own studio, suggests that students choose clothes that reflect their own personality instead of just following others.

\"It might not be important for you to know what kind of culture your jacket represents, but it does matter whether or not it suits you,\" Zeng said.