Home > Ethnic Peoples > Miao > Setting the Trends in Miao Fashion


Setting the Trends in Miao Fashion
by Xiao Kang
C ast your mind back thirty years or so and imagine you are
wandering through the streets of a market town somewhere in
south-eastern Yunnan. Minority people from the surrounding villages have walked many miles to come and ply their trade. The Miao women, with their pleated skirts, rectangular aprons and intricate leg wrappings, are unmistakeable.

You notice them standing in groups, chatting together animatedly. Some are wearing plain, white skirts. These are the White Miao. Others wear skirts dyed blue-green with black and white designs in batik. These are the Green Miao. Others wear skirts which are black from the waist to the knee but dyed white below the knee and overlaid with red and blue embroidery. These are the Flowery Miao. Here in Wénshān (文山) prefecture there are eight different sub-groups of Miao, each with its own distinctive style of dress. They live side-by-side, separate yet united by a common identity.

Pix
Embroidering on fluorescent fabric is all the rage in Xīchóu (西畴) county.

Pix
A Miao cloth merchant at a market in Fùníng (富宁) county.

Come to Wenshan today and a different picture meets your eyes. You will still see the distinctive pleated skirts, but now in a vast array of bright colours, orange, green, even neon. You will still see the distinctive rectangular aprons, but now embroidered in bold, modern designs, embedded with shiny sequins. You will still see the intricate leg wrappings, but they are slowly being replaced by frilly anklets that match fashionable high-heeled shoes. Traditional blouses have been transformed into garish, silk jackets, overloaded with beads and that fuse Chinese and Miao styles.

Welcome to the world of Miao hip, where kitsch equals trendy and loud equals cool. Wenshan is the centre of this booming fashion culture, a byword for chic among Miao communities in the farthest-flung corners of Yunnan province. Gone are the subdued hues and simple patterns of traditional Miao dress. People now come from far and wide to purchase brightly-coloured fabric, thread, pre-embroidered ribbons and sparkly adornments from the Wenshan cloth markets.

We asked Miss Yang, a young woman from Qiūběi county (邱北), whether she would wear traditional White Miao dress for us to photograph. After thoroughly searching her house, she announced, “I don’t think we have kept any. We’ve probably sold them all off to one of those Miao tradesmen from abroad.” We urged her to continue looking.

Eventually, she found a set of clothes under her grandmother’s bed. She dusted it off, looked at it and giggled. “It’s so old-fashioned, so plain and drab. Not even the old people wear these kinds of clothes any more.” After the photo shoot, she hurriedly changed back into her favourite costume— a brightly coloured red and white outfit laden with white beads. “Can you take a photo of me in these?” she asked, blushing slightly. These were clothes that she was proud to be seen in!

The Miao have always been famed for their bangx ndoub, or “flower cloth”, richly embroidered fabric used for appliqués, borders and aprons. And in the twenty-first century they have certainly not done away with it, but rather raised it to new levels. Today they incorporate new designs such as hearts, flowers and butterflies, along with complex modifications of more traditional geometrical shapes such as circles, spirals, and diamonds.

Most startling, perhaps, is the lavish use of gold and silver sequins, tinsel and beads, as well as fluorescent orange, green and yellow threads and fabrics. The dark blues and blacks dominating the scene of a Miao market town in the 1980s have been replaced by a dazzling array of eye-catching colours in the 2000s. Not only that, but those features which traditionally distinguished the various branches of Miao have now either merged into one or disappeared entirely. And with it, people’s sense of affinity with their particular branch of Miao has weakened dramatically. A new, united Miao identity is emerging.

The story is the same all over Wenshan prefecture. On one hand, the remarkable re-invention and innovation in Miao fashion conspicuously indicates that Miao cultural identity is vibrant. On the other, perhaps it portends the end of the diversity of Miao sub-groups which have co-existed over the centuries. Only time will tell. But one thing is for sure: the Miao of Wenshan are proud to be setting the trend in latest Miao fashion. And they are, without doubt, proud to be Miao.