Entrepreneur’s success wrapped in traditional garb
Print Edition
Du Jun turned her back on an engineering degree, learned to use a sewing machine and started marketing ancient traditional clothing called hanfu. Her insistence on authentic details has made her business a success. Wu Huixin pieces together thesartorial story.
In Chinese TV serials, films and other performances, people can often see ancient traditional Chinese dress called hanfu, or Han clothing, known for big, loose cuffs, crossed lapels and ankle-length tunics tied with a sash.
In Hangzhou, Hanyin Studio specializes in custom-tailoring hanfu. The boss, Du Jun, 40, a mother of two girls, has been dedicated to making hanfu for 10 years, and her reputation has grown among local hanfu hobbyists.
Du was set for a career in communication engineering when she graduated from Zhejiang University. But because she was obsessed with hanfu, she gave up the path picked by her parents and started to produce hanfu all by herself.
Without any training in garment-making, Du began by learning how to use a sewing machine. Then she searched the Internet for hanfu patterns and tried to copy them.
It took her 18 days to produce her first garment. “I had to make changes at times, because I didn’t know any techniques in sewing hanfu,” Du said. Half a year later, she had mastered the skills of hanfu making. It now takes her only two to three days to finish one.
During the initial year, Du rented a store in a lane alongside bustling Hefang Street and made it into a studio. But business wasn’t as good as expected, and she struggled to make ends meet. She closed the shop and moved the studio into her own house.
After years of development, she now has a dozen employees. Customers can order hanfu on her Taobao shop (http://hanyin-guan.taobao.com) or go to her house on Wenyi Road to order. Hanfu made by her studio costs over 1,000 yuan (US$164).
“Making hanfu is my dream. And I hope that people can get to know the authentic version of hanfu, not the garments with changes and innovations,” Du said.
Hanfu is only one kind of traditional Chinese clothing. Many people mistakenly think qipao (a body-hugging, one-piece dress) is a type of hanfu.
Qipao and other traditional clothes that appeared since the founding of Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) are not part of hanfu.
When the Manchu conquered the Han people and established the Qing Dynasty, they banned hanfu and forced people to wear Manchu-style clothing in order to consolidate the regime. Qipao is a derivative of that style.
People who wore hanfu against the ruler’s orders were executed during the Qing Dynasty, and the time-honored garment style nearly disappearing during that time.
Hanfu dates back four millennia. “The Book of Han” says it was created by the Yellow Emperor, a progenitor of Chinese civilization. Through the dynasties, hanfu was the daily apparel of Chinese Han people before the invasion of the Manchu.
Hanfu also influenced China’s neighboring countries. During the Tang Dynasty (AD 618-907), it spread to Japan through Japanese ambassadors who came to China to learn from the booming Tang culture. Later, Japanese incorporated their own features into hanfu, and kimonos came into being.
Around 2003, a movement was launched to reintroduce hanfu into Chinese people’s lives. As a result, many entrepreneurs saw a business opportunity and began making hanfu.
“Some businessmen blindly chase economic interests without caring about the essence of hanfu. Some garb produced by them was not genuine hanfu, which misled customers,” Du said.
For instance, the left lapel of hanfu must be diagonally crossed over the right. But some garment makers don’t pay attention to such details and just wrap the right lapel over the left.
As a stickler for tradition, Du wanted to spread basic knowledge about hanfu. In 2009, she and her friends organized what they called the Ancient Chinese Dress Team.
They looked for models to wear Du’s hanfu. Then, they took photos and posted them on the Internet. Their garments drew favorable comments on the social website Renren.com.
Though people no longer wear hanfu in everyday life, hobbyists or historical re-enactors still use the garments during festivals or ceremonies like weddings.
Du’s studio offers traditional Han-style wedding service. They provide costumes and an emcee.
“More and more Hangzhou people are choosing the traditional Han wedding ceremony, during which they can experience ancient wedding rites,” Du said.
Also, many cosplay (costume play) fans wear hanfu during cartoon and animation festivals, which has helped popularize hanfu to some extent.
“Cosplay is a good beginning. If cosplayers would delve more deeply into hanfu, it could bring a lot of progress,” Du said.
“The biggest obstacle to the development of hanfu is that people still know little about it. I hope more and more Chinese people will wear hanfu in ceremonies and festivals.”
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