Reflection on Hong Kong Trip

The first expression Hong Kong gave me is that it is a much diversified city. Most of the people there can speak at least three languages which are Cantonese, Mandarin and English. Hong Kong is also a special zone of free speech. You can see people express their opinions of general election on the street and books of political feelings. Moreover, I think Hong Kong is also a city that pays attention to environment, especially “white pollution”. No matter is stop shops or super markets, they do not offer plastic bag for free. Even Yakult drinks in Hong Kong do not provide straws.

The main reason we went to Hong Kong is to purchase fabric and I feel that Sham Shui Poi is a good choice. I went to two places for fabric searching before which are Chinatown in Singapore and Nippori Textile Town in Tokyo.

Compare to these two places, Hong Kong definitely have a wider range of different type of fabrication. Singapore market has a very limited choice for natural content fabric especially silk and wool content fabric. On the other hand, the main textile in Tokyo is Japanese style print fabric for kimono.

However, having more choices for fabric is not necessarily a good thing. Before I went to Hong Kong, I already decide to use a TPU fabric that has a colorful laser shining. This textile is perfect for my concept “plastic surgery”. The way it shines is very modern but synthetic. I want to translate the idea of “the new perception of beauty is to combine both prosthetic and natural beauty” through using natural content fabric and this TPU fabric.

TPU fabric

All these choice I have in Sham Shui Poi definitely distracted my attention on the first day. I started to collect random sample as long as it looks good. When I looked back all the samples that l had collected during the lunch break, I realized that most of them cannot perform the shape I wanted. I need to finalize a clear direction for my fabric so that I do not get lost in this dazzling market.

After that I relooked at my initial designs and decided my main fabric should be something that has structure and shimmery. The first few names came into my mind are duchess satin, brocade and suiting. To complement the main material, I will use organza or netting.

The sourcing trip became more efficient after that. I started to visit store that only sells eveningwear fabric. The new issue is that satin that has structure are all made of polyester or other synthetic fiber. Although the thickness is what I want but it is too shining with my TPU to look high end. Besides this, the color is too bright and bold for my color scheme. On the other hand, silk content satin is too draped and soft for my silhouette. It is more like a lining fabric to me.

After I consulted with Joe about all these issues and my concerts I had, he helped me find the best choice in Moon Yue, which is a silk wool blend material. It is the first time I touch a silk wool fabric. It is very hard and structure but still has a silk shimmery.

For the next few days, I finalized two color story and we decide to combine both of them because the color blocking of pink and green looks young and energetic.

The other aim for this trip is to do market research. I found that most young people especially local people prefer to shop in PMQ instead of harbor city and central mall. Most of them are student, freshman in workplace or people who has a more unique and personalized taste in fashion. The pricing of PMQ is around 2000HKD for a dress, 1500HKD for a top and pants, 3000HKD for an outerwear. The cost performance is very high compare to some of the bridge and high-end brands like Calvin Klein, Alice + Olivia and Stella McCartney.

To conclude, the whole experience of Hong Kong trip is generally very efficient and worth to go. It relieved the pressure on study and Hong Kong has inspired me in many ways. On the other hand I think Hong Kong has a good market for new designers compare to Mainland. A lots of young people from mainland only care about “branding” rather than good designs. I will definitely consider this if I want to build up my own label. Moreover, I would love to travel around the world and experience different culture in the future.