Imagine a Chinese person. Now think of their hair.
Is it black? Straight?
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Yes, yes of course it is! That's because most Chinese are from the Han ethnicity. Many Chinese, especially the younger generations, strive to set themselves apart by doing funky things to their hair.
Some strive for an exotic "Western" look through popular hair dying and color treatments, and there are a plethora of orange-headed Chinese women vainly attempting to look like Hollywood bombshells. Another popular technique is to create texture in otherwise straight hair. Crimping and layers and lots of hair gel are the most common ways to do this. The feathered mullet is really popular with women. Hair is teased and feathered in thick, afro layers on top, and a few stringy crimped bits are left hanging down. Combine this with a wack dye job and you've got one stylin' Chinese lady. Or women will crimp or texturize only part of their hair - perhaps the top, or only the left side. |
Trendy boys often have longish hair, cut in jagged layers and spiked with hair products for that tousled, I-just-burst-out-of-a-cartoon look.
That said, there are of course many people who don't style their hair in a particularly fancy way. And so there are legions of women running around with ponytails secured by sparkley, glittery hair scrunchies, numerous barrets and hair clips, and long chin-level bangs.
How to make dress other women admire
In a nutshell, the more sequins, glitter, rhinestones, bells, Chinglish, embroidery, ruffles, and plastic flowers on something, the cooler it is. In other words, crank it up to 10 on the childishly pseudo-feminine, wholesale clothing mart-o-meter, and you've got the look.
Chinese fashion often features gathers around strange places, and ruffles on everything. Baggy pants will drawstring tight at the ankle or above the knee. Baggy shirts cinch together at the hips. Ties above the knees or shirtsleeves create poofy, voluminous looks on traditionally angular bodies. Verticle belt straps crawl down shirt sleeves, pockets of all sizes and shapes decorate all parts. Tiny pockets, gigantic pockets, low voluminous pockets that begin below the bum. A popular style for women is to wear fitted jeans with huge, poofy, cargo pants-style pockets sewn all over. Clothing often sports extra embroidery of contrasting colors. And of course, designer rip-offs are popular - adidas, playingboy, bahting ape...
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Compared to the Americas, women dress much more conservatively. While you might find the occaisonal stylin' young lady wearing a pair of tight jeans, shorts, or spagetti strap tops, they are in the minority. Bare midriffs and cleavage are absent.
Shoes Footwear is very important. Everyone wears heels all the time, men included, even if they're hiking up a mountain. Although Chinese people are getting taller, most women are about 160cm (5'2") without their ever-present heels, and men aren't much taller. Even models often don't reach higher than 170cm (about 5'6"). If you're a stylish woman, you probably have rhinestone flowers and sequins on your shoes. In the winter women have similarly bedecked heeled boots, worn over their jeans to show off the bells, sequins, pearls, rhinestones, patchwork and embroidery. |  |
Jewellry
Jade jewellry is very popular, and many women of all ages sport either a jade bracelet, or a jade buddha hanging on a red string around their necks. As jade is often expensive, some women will never remove their bracelets. As they get older and put on weight, the bracelet eventually becomes impossible to remove without cutting it off. Rather than ruin an expensive gift, many women bear the pain.
Tattoos & body modification
In the bigger, internationalized cities like Shanghai or Hong Kong it is much more common to see a variety of visible tattoos and piercings, but it is not near the amount you would see in other international cities. In the west, where minority culture is more pervasive, you'll see many women with their noses pierced with a small stud. Amongst younger people tattoos are becoming more and more popular.
Multiple piercings of the ears seems to be the quiet, acceptable way to embrace body modification in most of the country, and if you take a close look at people's ears you'll see silver spiraling it's way up and down cartilege, although barbells are rarely seen, especially on women. If a man has his ears pierced you can be certain he prescribes to the one ear only rule.