Fashion

The logo of Temu, an e-commerce platform owned by PDD Holdings, is seen on a mobile phone displayed in front of its website, in this illustration picture taken 26 April 2023. (Florence Lo/Reuters)

US legal battle exposes Temu and Shein's questionable business practices

Chinese e-commerce giants Temu and Shein are currently locked in a heated battle for the US market and Chinese supply chain. As both sides are digging in their heels and accusing the other side of unsavoury business practices, who will emerge victorious?
Clothes are displayed on hangers at a Chinese fashion brand Shein pop-up store in Paris on 4 May 2023. (Christophe Archambault/AFP)

Why Chinese women’s clothing are getting smaller

Are women in China getting more conscious about their body image? Or is the clothing industry part of the problem as it makes smaller-sized clothes that could even fit children? Lianhe Zaobao’s China Desk looks into the trend in clothes manufacturing and its impact on Chinese women’s body image.
A couple poses during a pre-wedding photo session on the promenade on the Bund along the Huangpu River in Shanghai, China, on 24 September 2021. (Hector Retamal/AFP)

The crux of gender inequality is that men have always objectified women

Rather than addressing the symptoms of gender inequality such as restrictions on career prospects and freedom, says Cheng Pei-kai, we need to look at the deeper issue of the objectification of women. Chinese history and literature texts are replete with examples of this tendency. Mindful reading of the classics and an awareness that women are still objectified in modern life will go some way in changing mindsets. Whether in art or life, women are complex like anyone else and their characters and emotions need to be fleshed out before they can be truly seen for who they are.
Fashion creations of Ji Wenbo (first and second from left) and Andrew Gn.

A dialogue with Andrew Gn and Ji Wenbo: Fashion is an attitude to life

What is fashion to Singaporean fashion designer Andrew Gn and Chinese fashion designer Ji Wenbo? How do they stay true to themselves in an ever-changing fashion world? Though each designer has different styles, each is adept at stitching together a fabric of different influences. As their creations are sashayed down the catwalks of Paris and Milan, we see glimmers of East and West, the traditional and modern, the classic and the avant-garde — all in one place. Chinese Media Group correspondent Ng Yimin speaks to fashion designers Gn and Ji as part of a series of fireside chats put together to commemorate the 30th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Singapore and China.
Two mothers in red qipaos hug their children at an exam centre in Hainan, 7 July 2020. (Luo Yunfei/CNS)

Purple underwear and qipao — tips to ace China’s gaokao

China’s gaokao began yesterday, with millions of students taking this national university entrance exam (gaokao). One phenomenon that got Zaobao correspondent Yang Danxu curious was students wearing purple underwear to the exams. She examines this and other superstitions that give students a mental boost in the exam, and says that the gaokao needs to remain fair.