China: A Fashionating Study

Grin and Wear It!

When packing a suitcase, the main question that pops up in most people’s heads is “What will I need or want to wear?”  Guidelines when packing for China are simply that anything goes.  As far as fashion is concerned in the Orient all bets are off and the rules are: there are no rules. 

Fifty years ago people in China didn’t have the option to express themselves through their choice in clothing (or virtually anything else for that matter), so I suppose their overcompensation these days is justified to a certain degree.  The fact that there are roughly 1.3 billion people in China means there’s some fierce competition to stand out in the crowd.  And believe me, plenty of people try their damndest to do anything but blend in.  The Chinese people are the epitome of overzealousness in nearly everything: they have an insane work ethic, they have some of the worlds’ highest test scores and most notable engineering achievements, they embrace an aggressive take-no-prisoner style of driving, and these attitudes are enthusiastically reflected in their attire.

The best way I can describe the way the majority of women (and quite a few men) dress is with serious reckless abandon and zero self-restraint.  It’s as though their closet or dresser was alive and puked out whatever combo it wanted and the wearer simply said, “ok, but let me add a couple frilly bows to my hair, pin a mini-stuffed animal to my sweater and put three more pairs of bright, sparkly colored socks on to pad my tiny feet from my excessively bejeweled, furry hooker heels.”

Sometimes it feels like I just walked off of what I picture the set of Mariah Carey’s movie Glitter would look like.  I can imagine every person was handed a Bedazzle machine and a bag full of rhinestones and was told to cram on as many as humanly possible.  Thus, you see women walking around in baggy sweatshirts with gigantic, blindingly sparkly Mickey Mouse heads (or Winnie the Pooh, or any other Disney character for that matter) plastered to the front, and guys with shirts that are pin striped in glitter. 

Besides Disney and glitter, other common themes in clothing include animal print (the more different types one can fit into one outfit the better, and bonus points if real fur is included somewhere as well), cheesy English phrases (they absolutely do NOT have to make sense, nobody here cares that much about what it actually says), and a wide range of knock-off luxury brand name clothing, bags and sunglasses.  I’ve also seen children dressed like adults, adults like children and babies like little emperors.    

As with everything in China, there is a balance in what people wear.  Though many dress over the top, the others simply go out in their tacky fleece or luxury silk pajamas and Croc sandals and don’t give a damn to what they look like while venturing out in public.  And to be honest, the public doesn’t much care either. 

Summary: To blend in try to stand out, chances are you’ll look just like every other over-adorned person on the street.  If you are a foreigner it really doesn’t matter what you wear, you will get blatantly stared and pointed at no matter where you go.