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Digital darling
How does one stage a fashion show in the time of coronavirus? Ask Angel Chen. With limited resources – from having models stuck in lockdown to inaccessible shoot locations – Chen and her team pulled through just in time to make Shanghai’s Digital Fashion Week last April.
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In a Vogue interview, Chen credited her team for taking on the challenge, as they strategised how she could best launch her collection in a digital space. The designer styled the collection herself and had to direct the shoot from a safe distance – through video call! – as she was in self-quarantine.
Her virtual presentation, called “Aurora”, showed no signs of the restrictions she and her team were subject to. “The virtual show really allowed me to go all-out creatively,” Chen told Vogue. She uploaded the full video on her brand’s Instagram.
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Colour story
Born in Shenzhen, China, to a family in the business of wall paints, Chen’s father was a colour engineer who spent much of his time in his laboratory, discovering and developing colours. “When I was growing up, I always went to his factory to check the colour,” the designer shared in Next in Fashion. “I’m basically born in colour. Colour is kind of like my DNA.”
Chen reveals in an interview with Refinery29 what inspired her to become a designer. Seeing John Galliano’s 2007 couture collection “Madame Butterfly” in a Vogue issue – a collection that was heavily Asian, with kimono-esque silhouettes, origami-inspired structures and models with Geisha make-up on – Chen was left in awe and immediately decided to attend the same fashion school as Galliano.
“It’s at Central Saint Martins that I think I found out who I [was], and discovered my own way of creating,” Chen explained in the interview. Her graduation collection, called “Les Noces”, breathed life into a story of two girls getting married in a forest wedding in Africa, in a ceremony that is full of “laughter, texture and colour.”
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Fashion forward
Since launching her brand, Chen’s work always includes two things: a merging of the Western and Eastern aesthetic and a design story that always takes reference from her country of origin, be it from Chinese literature, an opera or a song, or from centuries-old symbols and traditions.
While imaginative interpretations of her Chinese heritage have made her countrymen more aware and proud of their own culture, Chen also recognises how China is being perceived, especially in the fashion world: “China is a country traditionally known for mass production at low quality,” she told Refinery29. “And I really aim to change this idea and to purvey that, alongside products for the masses, we can also offer good design and a beautiful culture.”
Well-stocked in more than 70 international locations, we can’t see why not. Chen’s meticulous craftsmanship, bold colour choices and edgy take on everyday style are a testament to how fashion can inspire and transcend culture, geographic boundaries and global crises.
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