Chasing Dreams

 

Yan Hong (originally named He Yanhong but widely famous as Yan Hong on the internet), a 33-year-old traditional handicrafts designer from Chengdu, Southwest China's Sichuan Province, never expected that the traditional Chinese handicrafts she made could become a hit overseas and could give her an opportunity to introduce Chinese culture at the prestigious Oxford University, and cooperate with a foreign designer at fashion heaven -- Milan Fashion Week.

Yan Hong is good at using recycled materials, including abandoned copper sheets and cans, to imitate craft ornaments recorded in some ancient Chinese costume dramas, TV shows, and antique historical books.

 

In recent years, with the debut of more high-quality cultural TV shows, pursuing Guochao, also known as Chinese trends or "China chic," which expresses the rise of China's native fashion trends, has stirred a wave across the nation, especially among Generation Z. A large number of video bloggers like Yan Hong bring traditional Chinese cultures such as Hanfu, ancient makeup and musical instruments to a broader audience.

 

According to Yan Hong, she once restored the ornaments that drew inspiration from the Peking Opera, Dream of the Red Chamber, one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature, the glorious bronze tree unearthed from the famed Sanxingdui Ruins site, and the hairpin from a well-known painting Court Ladies Adorned by Floral Ornament from Tang Dynasty (618-907).

 

"I noticed that many images from the TV dramas are from Shanhaijing. I thought that it would be very interesting to put the elements of divine beasts into my creation," she said.

 

(Photo by Yan Hong)

 

 

Amazing the world

 

 

These handmade and highly restored headdresses in major costume dramas have made Yan Hong one of the most popular bloggers at Bilibili, one of China's leading video-sharing platforms, with 760,000 fans and more than 33.74 million views.

 

(Photo by Yan Hong)

 

Meanwhile, she synchronously posts the videos on her YouTube account subtitled in Chinese and English, which quickly garnered a lot of attention from a foreign audience. Some even follow the video guide she posted and try to make traditional Chinese headdresses themselves.

 

Due to her popularity on social media, Yan Hong was invited to give a speech at Oxford University in the UK in 2019.

 

When she showed a handmade headdress imitated from a hit Chinese drama Ruyi's Royal Love in the Palace, Yan Hong recalled that the audience was stunned as they didn't believe this artistic headdress was only made of copper sheet and feathers.

 

(Photo by Yan Hong)

 

 

Edited by Zhu Haiyue

Source: Global Times