Though the rickety bicycles and dust clouds are still ever-present in Beijing

Though the rickety bicycles and dust clouds are still ever-present in Beijing and Shanghai, their drab, government-owned department stores are fast being replaced by glossy high-end shopping malls and Asian flagships flogging names such as Chanel, Burberry, Louis Vuitton and Dior. China is swiftly becoming the top consumer of luxury goods, poised to takeover the US any day now. The pressure for the nouveau rich to show off their wealth has driven the market for sports cars, Rolexes and monogrammed handbags, as more and more Chinese drill into the conspicuous consumption craze. As Vogue China’s editor-in-chief Angelica Cheung says,

“Chinese people cotton on very quickly and they realise that fashion is not just a way of expressing yourself, it is also a way of positioning yourself. And that is very important in my country.”

The pressure for the nouveau rich to show off their wealth has driven the market for sports cars, Rolexes and monogrammed handbags, as more and more Chinese drill into the conspicuous consumption craze.

Indeed, Shanghainese women are known to buy not one, but multiple designer handbags ­– one in every colour ­– while many white-collar workers who can’t afford to do so choose to rent luxury instead, forking out around $30 a day and a hefty deposit to satiate their hunger for pretty things. Foreseeing the potential, Hermes launched their stand-alone Chinese label Shang Xia in 2010, giving all-new connotations to the tag “Made in China”.

“The logo is king in China and rich people are really rich. So it is a perfect place to grow fashion quickly – especially as the Chinese always know what they want, and they know the labels they want, from Vuitton to Mulberry,” says Cheung who, given Vogue China’s vast potential audience, is rapidly becoming one of the most powerful editors in the world,” says Cheung.

Though e-commerce has been slower to take off due to low credit card penetration and authenticity issues, it too is picking up with more and more companies looking to snag their piece of the fortune cookie. Spurred on by the figures, which suggest the turnover of luxury goods e-tailers could rise more than 100 per cent annually, Yoox Group launched mega-brand mart thecorner.com, while Net-A-Porter plans to fly its flag there later this year.

There has even been the startling suggestion that, on sheer numbers, Chinese women could save the flailing French couture industry. As Colin Dowell writes, “623 million Chinese are women. Even if only one in a million will have money to buy couture, that would produce figures not seen for 80 years.” The key concern is that designers will have to trim their tastes, creating un-French couture to meet the new market. What’s Chinese for “sacrebleu”?

American designers are also following suit in their bid to woo the moneyed Chinese consumer. The Council of Fashion Designers America (CFDA) recently announced an exchange program with China, encouraging local designers to tap into the Asian markets and enlisting big guns Proenza Schouler’s Jack McCollough and Lazaro Hernandez and China’s Uma Wang to get the ball rolling. Meanwhile, Alexander Wang ­– who in true Chinese tradition has had the importance of hard work and perseverance drilled into him since birth – has recently announced highly ambitious plans to open 14 stores there over the next year.

Though you’d be forgiven for thinking that China’s urban centres were a sea of monogram-emblazoned bags, that’s not the case. While the logo remains sovereign in mainstream society, there’s also a counterculture to bling emerging.

Understated Chinese brands such as Exception, Ran Fan’s architectural couture, textured Western-inspired offerings by Chi Zhang, Uma Wang, and Lu Liu, whose graduation design was displayed in the window of Saks Fifth Avenue in New York ­– are brands that could one day transition into Western stores.

Chinese women are also becoming a ubiquitous presence on and off the catwalk. Shu Pei, Du Juan, Bonnie Chen, Lily Zhi and Liu Wen herald a new crop of Asian supermodels, dominating the catwalks, scoring global campaigns, and moving beyond the tokenism of the past. With China’s veneration for luxury labels becoming ever more apparent, it seems only natural for designers to utilise Asian faces. Word is Chanel and Dior are even paying Chinese starlets, including actresses Huo Siyan, Li Xiaolu and Lin Peng, to sit on their front rows ­­as a means of grabbing the attention the Chinese consumer.

New York, Paris, Milan … Beijing? How long will it take for China to gain fashion super status? Are Western designers finally widening their beauty lens or are their efforts merely driven by dollars and numbers? And as “Made in China” becomes “Made for China”, there is certainly a sartorial revolution brewing.

http://www.dailylife.com.au/dl-fashion/fashion-coverage/could-china-become-the-next-fashion-superpower-20120321-1vj3q.html