By MARION HUME/BEIJING
"I don't need a man to buy me anything," says Bao Bao Wan, 26, as she caresses her orange Hermès Birkin bag, a recent splurge. Wan, a fine-jewelry designer who splits her time between Beijing and Hong Kong, knows exactly the kind of guy she'd like to meet. "He'll probably have to be Western. Chinese men just don't get women from the new generation."
China's new generation of young women share the same dreams as many of their Western sisters: find a great job, meet a great man. The difference is that many of the more than 200 million young adults under 30 in China today are already experiencing a lifestyle both unattainable and unimaginable to their mothers, who grew up in Mao's China and then started families when Deng Xiaoping launched the one-child policy in 1979. Wan, who can easily command the best private room at a local restaurant, explains the generation gap as her chopsticks hover over the lunchtime dumplings.
"During the Cultural Revolution, my mother was sent to the countryside, and I don't mean Southampton!" says Wan, whose mother had to toil on a farm. Despite their generational divide, Wan says her mother is supportive of her choices. Wan's preferred uniform of skintight leather pants and sleek white shirt unbuttoned to reveal a flash of lacy bra, for example, is a far cry from the Mao jacket her mother had to wear. "If I dress a little bit sexy, she thinks I look beautiful," Wan says. "I'm the youth she didn't have."
While Wan admits she's not an average Beijinger (she was educated in the U.S. and France and now lives part-time in Hong Kong), she says her hometown friends share the same angst experienced by friends in Manhattan. "Chinese girls are not as conservative as you think," she says, laughing. Her life in Beijing is spent forging her career, shopping for luxury goods, partying at private clubs and, of course, trying to meet the right guy.
But China's Me generation also has to prove adept at surfing a culture that's changing at a dizzying speed. While the rise of the Chinese economy is not unexpected, it's happening faster than anyone would have predicted. According to a Credit Suisse study, income among 20-to-29-year-olds grew 34% in the past three years, with a third of the same age group using credit cards—a concept largely foreign to previous generations. And yet the urban dwellers in this demographic don't seem the least bit disoriented by the booming capitalist-within-communist system—a fact that's not lost on European luxury retailers.
"Because China went through a recent dark age, because their mothers didn't have things, this generation is learning afresh," says Fendi ceo Michael Burke, who last fall branded the Great Wall with Fendi's double-F logo and held its first-ever fashion show there, setting the stage for more brand expansion. "They don't have a generation before them to refer to style-wise, so they are daring with the choices they make."
These young women are also incredibly ambitious. When Wan met Dior CEO Sidney Toledano at a recent dinner, for example, she asked him to invest in her company. "Why not?" Wan asks, shrugging and gesticulating so that the tiny diamond-encrusted gold butterfly perched on the bamboo-style ring on her finger trembles. "It's tragic," she says, talking about the ring. "The ephemeral butterfly is a Chinese girl expected to accept the solid bamboo, which can never change. Every piece of my jewelry represents myself and a generation of Chinese women who are fragile yet very bold and crazy."
No word back from Toledano yet, but Wan, who calls herself a communist girl living in a capitalist world, says she can see the day when the luxury-goods trade in China will no longer be a one-way street. "I want to be a brand. I want to make beautiful things that are appreciated by people both here and in Europe," she says. "China has taken on the American Dream: if you work toward what you want and if you are smart enough, you'll get it."
Of course, not all of the young adults have the guanxi (connections) to rival Wan's. Her father is a government minister and her grandfather Wan Li was the chairman of the National People's Congress Standing Committee. Like Wan, Wendy Ye, 28, an evening-wear designer, also grew up in a privileged world. Her mother was a show host, an honor reserved for the most beautiful and demure, while her paternal grandfather Ye Jianying was one of Mao's top officials and was later judged a hero after he arrested the notorious Gang of Four.
Ye is engaged to an American banker. For their wedding next fall, she will wear a gown of her own design—in contrast to her mother, who got married in a Mao suit. "She's so happy for me," says Ye. "Although my dad was a little surprised when I told him I was marrying a foreigner, because Chinese are very proud of being Chinese."
Sipping her Starbucks in Soho—that's Soho Beijing, a chic residential, shopping and office development, which, like its London and New York equivalents, is great for people watching—Ye describes herself as a trend setter. She was the first in her crowd to sport a tan, she says, and her acrylic nails—currently in a black-lace-and-diamanté pattern—are deemed so radical, her manicurist photographs them so that other girls can copy them. Today Ye is dressed in a pair of skinny pants that she picked up in L.A. ("I've been into supertight for years") and a 1930s-style satin blouse bought locally ("It's not really vintage—Chinese don't wear old clothes"), accessorized by a black-diamond Chanel J12 watch.
At night—Beijing is a party town—Ye wears silk gowns by Studio Regal, the label she started four years ago after graduating from London's St. Martins fashion school. Her designs are gaining in popularity among the social set. "Before, if there was a Dior party, people thought they had to wear Dior," says Ye. "Now, no one wants to bump into someone wearing the same dress. The slavishness is finished."
Ye adds that another reason she has found her niche is that Western luxury brands are mostly selling bags and shoes in China. She counts among her favorites Fendi, Valentino and Chanel. And among fashionistas trying to convey their insider knowledge, below-the-radar names like Loro Piana and Bottega Veneta are desirable. "Louis Vuitton is for girls from second-tier cities now," she says, deeming the company old news because it has been in China for more than a decade. Indeed, Louis Vuitton has been so successful here that its name is used as a generic term for luxury.
At 31, Jessica Zhang is a little older than the Me generation, but she identifies with what the twentysomethings are achieving. Zhang, who helms the Beijing branch of Quintessentially, a global concierge business, is the daughter of a doctor and a teacher from Changchun in northeast China. She learned English herself, eventually saving enough to tour Thailand and seven European cities. "I sat in small cafés, and I watched people. My English was not good, I had very little money, and I was lonely," she says. "I thought then I would live abroad, but now everyone is focused on China, so I'm here."
Quintessentially Beijing is basically a finishing school for the new rich. "We educate our members in a nice way," she says. "They want to learn what fork to use, what wine to choose." She might accompany clients to Fauchon, the French luxury-food emporium that opened a three-story outpost in Shin Kong Place, one of Beijing's glittering luxury malls. Fauchon, where everything—from the glazed éclairs to the brioche—is exactly comme en France, also holds regular "how to" evenings. "We explain you don't put mustard in coffee," says Natalie Monlezun, Fauchon's marketing manager. "French tastes are so very new here.They don't know what goes with what."
Across town is Beijing's new Seasons Place shopping center, where the anchor tenant is a Lane Crawford store, currently the Hong Kong retailer's only beachhead in mainland China. Inside the store is a surprise—not just because the interior features art installations that would make even the most rarefied of U.S. retailers start thinking of upping their game—but because of the labels on the racks: Maison Martin Margiela, Vanessa Bruno, Rick Owens. "We don't even have Rick Owens in Hong Kong!" says Bonnie Brooks, president of the Lane Crawford Joyce Group. "The speed at which this level of sophistication has been reached here is something that has surprised us. Young Beijingers are now so fashion savvy, they already want the not-so-showy labels."
They also want private clubs to go with their "insider" labels. One such place is the Lan Club, a 60,000-sq-ft. (5,600 sq m) Philippe Starck-designed dining space that is a favorite among Beijing's wealthy hipsters. When Zhang's clients want to book a private room here, she calls owner Danny Wang. A handsome man-about-town, Wang is the Ian Schrager of Beijing. His next glossy project, which should be finished by the time the Olympics get under way, is the city's first cutting-edge designer hotel.
Although Wang talks about being caught up in the communist-capitalist boom, he has a dream that stretches beyond the rampant consumerism that has captivated his generation. "One or two years ago, I thought this would never be possible," he says. And he is not talking about an even bigger restaurant or another collaboration with Starck but rather a project that entails building a free hospital for those left behind in China's dazzling boom.
"Those of us with wealth have responsibility," says Wang, who thinks the current consumer obsession is the natural first flush of excitement. "Our future cannot just be about that. It must be about combining wealth with a meaningful life."
MY COMMENTS
This long article is trying to tell us how the development in China has affected the people, especially women. Compard to the past, they are able to choose their marriage partner and arranged marriages are not common anymore. The women in China now go all the way to find their perfect partner with capabiltity. The rapid development and an attractive place for investors in China is due to the rising consumerism in China. People now are more willing and able to spend on imported products from the West. This also sets me thinking about the status of women in China society now. Reading this article, i will think that the women's status in China is getting better as they are given equal opportunities in education and work and they need not depend on their husbands which happened in the past. Thus, it can be seen that the liberalisation of China's economy has a positive impact on the society too. Labels: posted by ying hua
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