REFLECTIONS IN A CHINESE EYE

Anna Burnside: The Commie consumers of China

As the Chinese economy booms, our reporter looks at the people's great leap towards bling.

• Chinese spending on fashion reached £8bn in 2010. Photo: AFP

THE People's Republic of China, a centrally governed communist state with 1.3 billion citizens is, as noted economist Jessie J would have it, all about the money. Since 1978, when leader Deng Xiaoping declared: "China has been poor for too long. To get rich is glorious," it has become the world's fastest-growing major economy, going from the bicycle to the BMW in one generation.

By hoovering up the top positions in state-run enterprises and taking advantage of the vast government contracts that come with rapid industrialisation, party officials and their children have thrived in the brave new communism-with-benefits world. Those who started their own companies, especially in construction, have done even better. The new Hurun Rich List, of Chinese individuals with a net worth of over 10 billion yuan (£1 billion), numbers 127.

For those who did not have the foresight, or resources, to get into earth movers at the start of the boom, things are not so cheery. The national average income is 50,000 yuan (£5,000), less than Angola and Albania. Only 24 million of the population's earnings are above the tax threshold. This vast gap between the ostentatiously spendthrift rich and the struggling poor has prompted a government rethink. Consumption, say the authorities, must become less conspicuous. Earlier this year, Beijing outlawed billboard advertisements that promoted "hedonism, lavishness and the worship of foreign things".

Will this work? Avery Booker of the analytical website Jing Daily suggests that stealth wealth will become the new cha-ching: "While there will always be a market for garish, tank-like Russian SUVs, chunky diamond-studded watches and logo-festooned bags, the country's ultra-wealthy, becoming ever more cautious about consumption, will likely gravitate towards boutique labels, private clubs and discreet concierge services." None of which are exactly cheap.
In the meantime, what are the commie consumers spending their cash on?

Read more at scotsman

Chinese Push Up Bra Infomercial

China: Shopping mad in Shanghai

A frenzy of buying and selling makes this the most dynamic city in China.

AP High life: Toutists photograph the epic building projects at Pudong

Cross the road in Shanghai's former French Concession and you commit yourself to participating in a form of traffic ballet, the subtleties of which will elude you at first. A red light here is not, as you might previously have assumed, a full stop in a vehicle's onward journey. Instead, the closest it gets to punctuation is as a comma, the briefest of pauses, allowing everyone to assess life-preserving spatial relationships.

For the pedestrian such delicate nuance is everything. In this case, I had clearly misinterpreted the green-man signal shining opposite me as an all-clear to cross the road. And presumably that is what the elderly gentleman explained to me, in unambiguously exasperated Mandarin, after he'd cycled rather painfully into my leg.

Even the threat of traffic wipe-out does not detract from the charm of this enclave of residential back-streets, created in the late 19th century when parts of Shanghai were loaned to foreign powers for trading purposes. The colonial-era influence extends as far as the 1920s low-rise villas that line the roads, and to the plane trees that offer welcome splashes of green against sombre urban grey-brown.

I continued – limping slightly – down Fumin Road, its pavements packed with people, passing shabby local stores selling everything from motorbike parts to cats. At number 87 I stopped to peer in at the mass of well-to-do diners enjoying lunch at a smart eatery called Guyi. The cuisine here is from Hunan, a province south-west of Shanghai that is known for its spicy, chilli-centric flavours. A slogan outside boasted that the restaurant offered a "new concept share with your heart". (Given the notoriously fractious relationship between the Chinese authorities and Google, it seems odd that most of Shanghai's signage appears to have been run through the internet company's "Translate" application for the benefit of Westerners. Perhaps it's no coincidence that the words are rendered strangely meaningless in the process.)

Read more at The Independent

Out of Africa

Younga, a boutique that sells dresses sewn from African fabric and accessories made by artisans from across Asia, wears its heart on its sleeves

 
Opened by Claire Liang in 2008, Younga’s dresses and accessories are sewn from lively wax print fabric.

Photo: Catherine Shu, Taipei Times

Run out of a tiny boutique in Red House Theater’s 16 Workshops (16工房), Younga presents a worldview on fashion. The brand specializes in clothing made from cloth produced by African artisans, but also sells items crafted in Thailand, China and Taiwan.

Founder Claire Liang (梁又平) became smitten with African wax print fabrics while volunteering in Cameroon. An avid traveler who pens a monthly column for Green (綠雜誌), a magazine about environmental issues, Liang opened Younga in 2008 after returning from the west African country, where she worked with the Association pour la Promotion de l’Artisanat et de la Nature (APAN), an organization that promotes traditional arts and crafts, fair-trade practices and the use of natural materials.

The travel bug bit Liang, who majored in French at university, after a post-graduation trip to the Middle East. She backpacked through Egypt, Jordan and Israel, where she harvested apples and worked in a restaurant on a kibbutz. She walked around in her spare time talking to residents, spending one afternoon discussing Taiwanese history with a village chief in Egypt and another taking tea and dancing with a group of women.

Read more at Taipei Times

Taiwan targeting China's fashion market

TAIPEI, Taiwan — Once known around the world for its cheap garment exports, Taiwan is now seeking to leverage a new opening to the China market to make its mark on the Asian fashion stage.

While several Taiwanese designers have been recognized for their work internationally, government officials say the lack of a homegrown high-end design industry is holding them back.

But that could soon change, they say. A trade deal signed in June will make the Chinese market more open to the Taiwanese, slashing tariffs on goods including apparel and punishing mainland copycats of Taiwanese designs.

The deal is part of President Ma Ying-jeou's overall effort to reduce tensions with China, and build a more cooperative relationship across the 100-mile- (160-kilometer-) wide Taiwan Strait 61 years after the island and the mainland split amid civil war.

Vice Economics Minister Huang Chung-chiu said lower tariffs are good news for the island's fashion industry, but only if it learned to change its focus from mass production to market innovation.

"The era of mass producing textile goods is gone," he said. "We are now counting on creative designers ... instead of engineers who have little knowledge about what consumers want."

Taiwan was once a dominant force in world textile production, but its ranking has slipped to No. 6 after many of its big players shifted operations to China in the 1990s to take advantage of lower labor costs. Taiwan's textile exports totaled $9.4 billion in 2009, a 40 percent decline from the heyday of 1997. China is the island's largest market, taking 22 percent of the 2009 exports.

The weight of the China market was evident at the annual Taipei Fashion Week show opened last week in a downtown exhibition hall. Several Chinese department store operators were in attendance, and Huang said they are expected to make big purchases.

Read more at Google hosted news

Levi’s struts its stuff in China

At a glance

Target audience: The new Levi Strauss brand is aimed at young consumers in emerging markets, starting with China, Singapore and South Korea. Models at the launch were wearing sneakers and high-heeled sandals: not a cowboy hat or boot in sight. Prices will range from $40 to $60, compared with traditional Levis, which sell for more than $100 in Shanghai’s upscale malls.
History: Levi Strauss, which retreated from the China market for a time in the mid-1990s citing concerns over labor rights, now has hundreds of outlets in China and plans to open up to 1,000 by 2015

Launches global line for youthful shoppers

SHANGHAI – Jeans maker Levi Strauss & Co. launched a new global brand in China, joining a growing list of companies that hope to crack this fast-growing and youthful market by tailoring their products to Chinese tastes.

Models at last week’s launch were wearing sneakers and high-heeled sandals: not a cowboy hat or boot in sight. The new brand is aimed at young consumers in emerging markets, starting with China, Singapore and South Korea.

With products such as Nissan sedans, watches and Hermes luxury goods, global companies increasingly are designing products and brands with the Chinese market in mind as incomes rise amid rapid economic growth.

The newest incarnation of Levi’s will aim at a broader segment of Chinese consumers than traditional Levi’s, which sell for more than $100 in the upscale malls along Shanghai’s Nanjing Road shopping strip.

“In the last few years we’ve seen a new group of consumers,” said Aaron Boey, president for Levi Strauss’s Asia-Pacific division. “Many of them want stylish clothes but at accessible prices,” he said. Levi is calling the new brand “dENIZEN.”

Read more at journalgzette

GQ China July 2010 Issue Yanked From Newsstands

 

 

GQ China's July issue was pulled from newsstands after "an unflattering feature on rich Chinese young people," the Wall Street Journal reports.

The article, titled "Super Kids Driving Luxury Cars," focused on six twentysomething Chinese members of Beijing's Sports Car Club, and featured several unflattering quotes from the members.

A sampling:

One man met an attractive woman and wanted to hang out -- until he realized her car was "five years out of fashion."

"Secondhand goods," he said, losing interest immediately.

This comment is rivaled in materialism perhaps only by 22-year-old model Ma Nuo's infamous claim that she would "rather weep in a BMW than smile on a bicycle."

The Sports Car Club president reportedly threatened to sue over the article because the writer allegedly did not make it clear enough that he was recording the interview. GQ declined to comment to the Wall Street Journal.

GQ China launched last fall in the hopes of targeting China's massive male market. It is just one of Condé Nast's pushes into the region, where the company — struggling in the United States — is looking for growth opportunities.

HUFFINGTONG POST

China's big-spending middle class to the rescue of Japanese retail

A NEW wave of Chinese visitors to Japan is expected after the Japanese government relaxes visa rules today.

This will make a further 16 million households in China eligible for tourist visas.

The change will allow middle-class Chinese to visit Japan, which will boost the country's depressed retail sector. Previously only very wealthy Chinese have been issued with tourist visas for Japan.

Still, the number of Chinese tourists was already on the rise, with 1.5 million expected this year.

Increasingly affluent Chinese are being welcomed by retailers.

Despite some cultural resistance among Japanese to a Chinese "invasion", big stores are rolling out the red carpet.

"Chinese are the saviours for us. I've never seen any foreign tourists spend as much as the Chinese," says Takeshi Araki, a salesman at Yodobashi Camera in Tokyo's bustling Akihabara electronics district.

Read more at The Australian

Chinese Tattoos

Chinese Tattoos Have Special Meaning

Many people have decided that they want to have a tattoo to decorate their body. Some of these people take some time to decide where they will place this tattoo, but many popular spots on the body include the ankles, arms and backs. Once people have decided that they want a tattoo, and they know where they want this placed, they have to decide which design they would like to have on their body. There are thousands of designs that are currently available for tattoos. There are many tattoo artists that continually come up with new and distinctive designs. Chinese tattoos are some of the most popular tattoos that are available.

The Chinese tattoos are available in many different designs. Some of the Chinese tattoos are based the symbols of the Chinese language. This language is made up of thousands of different characters rather than the letters that are used in the English language. These characters are often used in Chinese tattoos because they are intricate designs and because each one has some significant meaning. Some people choose their Chinese tattoo based on the meaning of a Chinese character while others choose Chinese tattoos because of the beauty of the figures.Famous People Increase The Popularity Of Chinese Tattoos

Chinese tattoos have become popular partly because some very visible, popular celebrities have shown up with these interesting tattoos. Many people saw these on the arms of some famous sports stars and admired the beauty of the design. Other people saw these designs on movie and television stars and decided to copy their favorite actors. Some of the people who have Chinese tattoos have no idea what these mean before they get the tattoo, but most people who have one of these distinctive tattoos find out the meaning once they decide on this type of tattoo.

Often these tattoos elicit questions and conversation from the people who see them. Others want to know about the significance of the Chinese design. Most people can provide information on the meaning of their tattoo. Most of the tattoos that are based on images from Chinese have special meaning associated with love, hope or peace. Some people may decide what they want their tattoo to express, and then they accept a Chinese symbol that expresses their idea. Anyone who is interested in a Chinese tattoo should try to check with someone who knows Chinese. People would not want to walk around with an offensive design on their body when they wanted to express something hopeful.

 
Read more at Hub Pages

Running Almost Barefoot

Vibram Five-Fingers are unique shoes for a new walking or running experience. (Louise McCoy/The Epoch Times)

One Sunday at the farmer’s market we met a friend. On looking down, we saw his feet were shod with shoes with toes. He immediately waxed enthusiastic, saying these were the most comfortable footwear in his experience and were recommended to him by a friend who runs. 

He is a walker and found them just as suitable for walking. It seemed that these “five finger shoes,” the Vibram Five Fingers, were as comfortable as going barefoot on a carpet.

However, later in the day we saw him navigating a gravel driveway rather gingerly, which made us wonder whether they were really so protective or just his psychological perception of what it would be like if he were really barefoot.

Humans were designed to go barefoot and to chase down their food. The construction of the foot impacts the whole body. Our arches and calves were designed as shock absorbers for the knees as the foot lands on the ball of the foot when running barefoot.

Shoes force our heels down first. Our balance is improved when our toes strengthen after being able to operate independently. Writing in Blogs, people who wear Five Fingers have reported knee, back, and foot pains disappearing and their posture improving.

For some, five-toed shoes may not be suitable. Dr. Robert A. Kornfeld, podiatrist from Manhasset, N.Y., said, “The forefoot (ball of the foot) needs to be stable to propel the body forward. Otherwise compensatory problems occur in the knees, hips, or lower back.”

People with unstable forefeet tend to have foot problems such as flat feet, hammertoes, or bunions. If you have some foot problem, consult your podiatrist, who will hopefully give exercises to correct the problem at its origin and prescribe transition footwear.

Many flat-footed people have claimed that their feet now have arches after wearing Vibrams.

These shoes at Fleet Feet Albany [N.Y.] produce the almost-barefoot experience. (Louise McCoy/The Epoch Times)

Most of us have left our barefoot days in childhood. These Vibrams give a new lease on barefoot adventuring, as they can be worn mountain climbing, in rocky creeks, on muddy trails, and on boats. For more information see Superbrian.net/barefooting-it-vibram-fivefingers and Birthdayshoes.com/vibram-five-fingers/kso/

Imagine how useful these shoes would be on a shell-strewn beach!

Barefoot running is now becoming more popular since Chris McDougal’s book “Born to Run,” 2009, about a Mexican tribe, the Tarahumara, who run long distances in minimal sandals with a barefoot advantage. Chris demonstrates these sandals on YouTube: youtube.com/watch?v=Xv4Se5ka9Pk&feature=related

Five Fingers are difficult to put on at first as our toes are not used to operating independently. After wearing them, some people experience various pains as unused muscles come into play.

The effects of rough terrain are only muted, so our friend mentioned above probably did feel the rocks. The smell can be awful as no socks are worn, but the good news is that the shoes are machine washable. They look funny.

They are made in China but so are a lot of pirated versions of inferior quality. To get the real thing go to Vibramfivefingers.com for a list of stores.

The Epoch Times

Samantha Cameron

By Chelsea Girl in China

 

Samantha Cameron, the Chinese cover girl

Samantha Cameron appears on the front cover of this week’s Grazia magazine in China.

It appears a coalition with the Liberal Democrats was not the only surprising outcome of voting Tory at the General Election.  It has also made a pretty dowdy housewife a Chinese style icon.

Carla Bruni is a firm favourite in China. Her attendance at the otherwise drab concert for the opening of the Shanghai World Expo, with Nicolas Sarkozy, scored the French huge brownie points. The glamour of France’s ‘first lady’ is not wasted on modern Chinese women. But the latest edition of Chinese Grazia champions David Cameron’s wife as the new rival to Bruni or 布鲁尼. A two-page feature inside the magazine, which last year became the first glossy fortnightly to be launched in China, profiles the wife of the new British Prime Minister. In it she is judged to to be more supportive and ‘better’ for her husband’s career, than Carla Bruni. She is also lauded for her fashion sense said to be achieved without the help of a stylist. And the reporter remarks that she has a better figure than Michelle Obama.  

Samantha Cameron is said to be a more supportive wife than Carla with a better figure than Michelle

Readers get a run-down of where Mrs Cameron buys her clothes: Topshop, Russell & Bromley, Zara, Jaeger, Ted Baker and Vivienne Westwood. So will it spawn a craze for sensible Tory chic in China? Who knows. But Cameron would do well to capitalise on it by visiting China soon, and bringing the new Chinese fashion icon with him.

Sam Cam a cover girl in China

Who’ll Stay At China’s Gucci Hotel?

Elisabetta Gucci Plans To Open 40 Luxury Hotels In Next 15 Years, Eying China Location Next Year

Elisabetta Gucci recently completed construction of her first five-star hotel in Dubai, announcing plans to open a China location in 2011

The Chinese luxury hotel market is a contentious and already crowded place, with the world’s top hoteliers battling it out with local upstarts and Hong Kong transplants, fighting a still nascent domestic travel industry, overcapacity and anemic occupancy rates, and a post-financial-crisis inbound tourism slump. Despite the obvious difficulties — and despite having to deal with issues, such as poor brand recognition, that aren’t as much of a problem in other parts of the world — hoteliers continue to invest heavily in the China market. In the last few months alone, we’ve seen new five-star hotels spring up not only in wealthier cities like Hangzhou and Shanghai, but also in lesser-known markets like Guilin, Nanjing and Yangzhou, and major chains like the Ritz-Carlton, the Four Seasons, and Shangri-La have recently announced major expansion plans expected to last well over a decade.

Recently, Elisabetta Gucci — the daughter of the fashion designer Paolo Gucci — announced that she intends to open 40 new five-star hotels globally over the course of the next 15 years, with plans to open a Dubai location at the end of this year and a location in China next year. While details on the China hotel are vague, according to Reuters, the Elisabetta Gucci hotel “experience” hinges heavily on branding and design, both inside and out:

Read more at Jing Daily

Dramatic restructuring of dinosaur feathers revealed by two youngsters of same species

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At the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xing Xu is looking at two beautiful dinosaur fossils, both with clear feathers on their arms and tails. In the smaller specimen, the feathers are like thin ribbons at their base and quills at their tips (with vanes coming off a central shaft). The larger specimen is different – its arm and tail feathers are like quills across their entire length.

With such different feather structures, you might assume that these animals belonged to different species, but you’d be wrong. They’re actually different life stages of the same animal – Similicaudipteryx. Both are youngsters, but the one with the quill-like feathers is an older version of the one with the ribbons. Together, they demonstrate that the feather of some dinosaurs changed dramatically as they grew older, in a way that we don’t see in any modern bird.

By now, readers of this blog should be familiar with the idea of feathered dinosaurs (and, indeed, Xing Xu has discovered many of them). A spectacular series of fossils have revealed a wide range of plumes in a wide range of species, and we even know something about their colour. But we still know very little about how these feathers developed as the animals matured, because fossils of young feathered dinosaurs are few and far between. So for Xu to find two, and two of the same species no less, is a real treat.

Read more at DISCOVER

Expo lures luxury brands to Shanghai

Market for upscale products continues to grow in China

SHANGHAI - Manufacturers of luxury fashion and accessory brands are lining up to increase their products' presence in Shanghai to coincide with the opening of Expo 2010, as China's huge consumer market continues to become a magnet for luxury European brands.

Shanghai is experiencing a big increase in luxury-brand stores, mainly in its upscale Huaihai Road shopping area, with many of the openings coinciding with the start of Expo.

Coach recently opened a signature store along Huaihai Road, while Louis Vuitton, Tiffany & Co, Cartier and Ermenegildo Zegna will open stores by the end of April. Hermes will join the list in the near future.

The openings are a culmination of a three-year plan on the commercial structure of Middle Huaihai Road in the city's Luwan District. Various other projects are being finalized in the area, known for both its European and Chinese architectural influences.

Read more at China Daily

Calvin Klein Marks Its Spot: China

China's jeans, underwear markets buoy hopes for world's fastest growth.

Tom Murry

SHANGHAI -- China, expected to top the world in luxury-goods spending in as little as five years, will be Calvin Klein's fast-growing market this year, CEO Tom Murry said in an interview.

Sales growth will be 20 to 30%, led by jeans and men's underwear, Murry said. The company expects to open 15 freestanding stores in China this year, adding to the 100 it already has. Murry didn't provide a revenue figure.

Calvin Klein backed up that forecast last Friday with a spirited runway show and party in a decades-old converted textile factory in northern Shanghai that attracted hundreds of distributors. The half-hour runway show highlighted more than 70 models from around the world, who strutted their threads to songs such as "Personal Jesus" and "Route 66."

Read more at Forbes

China's latest luxury obsession: Tibetan mastiffs

BEIJING (Reuters Life!) - Hailing from the Himalayan plateau, the lion-like Tibetan mastiff has become China's latest expensive indulgence.

The shaggy, 82 kg (180 lb) dog, known for its loyal but fierce disposition, has become the latest accessory for the country's legions of wealthy who are snapping up prime real estate, diamonds and luxury cars as the rest of the world slowly recovers from the fallout of the global economic crisis.

You Wenfa, owner of a mastiff breeding farm on the outskirts of Beijing, saw potential profits from the enormous hounds and purchased his first dog in the early 1990s.

You currently has over 40 dogs and goes back to Tibet every year to seek prospective additions to his stock.

He also provides breeding services and charges up to 100,000 yuan ($14,650) for a session with one of his pedigrees.

Read more (watch video) at REUTERS

The French connection

A sq km sandwiched between a hip shopping district and a dour commercial one, still retains a bit of 1930s Shanghai. Shi Junqian reports

If there is such a thing as a "hamlet" in Shanghai, it must be that "sleepy triangle", a square kilometer of tree-lined streets and low-rise houses tucked between the hip shopping district of Xujiahui and the button-down commercial strip of Huaihai.

Although sitting on one of the most valuable tracts of real estate in Shanghai, the old buildings, some dating back to the golden era of the 1930s, have escaped the wrecker's ball. There is a refreshing absence of monstrous housing complexes, crowd-drawing shopping malls or glass-and-steel office buildings that are common sights almost anywhere else in this city.

The few signs of progress are denoted by a number of elegant restaurants, chic cafes, an Irish pub and an up-market kitchenware shop. The latest addition to this collection of genteel indulgence is a fashion boutique that caters to, as its owner says, the "refined" taste of those young Shanghai elites who have newly discovered this "cool" enclave.

The best place to start exploring is the junction of Taojianglu, Dongpinglu and Yueyanglu. This was the heart of the French concession in the pre-war colonial days when Shanghai was known as "Paris of the Orient". On these streets, the French colonialists planted neat rows of French phoenix trees that stand to this day.

Among the former villa residences and low-rise apartment blocks lived some of the most famous and powerful figures of those turbulent times of civil strife and foreign invasion

Read more at China Daily

Pearls of wisdom

Stephen Bloom explores China's pearl culture for his latest work on this "accident of nature" which has attracted mankind for millennia. Liu Jun reports

A heap of Chinese freshwater pearls waiting to be sorted at a pearl  farm in Zhejiang province.

Stephen Bloom was running late. I stomped my feet on the cold cement floor to keep myself warm in Beijing's chilly early spring. At the Pearl Market, facing the Temple of Heaven, we were to meet a pearl dealer who had entertained Margaret Thatcher and other dignitaries.

The professor of journalism from the University of Iowa clearly wasn't in a hurry. He planted himself on a stool in front of a pearl stand on the second floor, and asked the young girl named Tammy to bring out one hank after another.

"I give you deal better than I give other customers," Tammy said in her broken English as Bloom finally got up, promising to come back once we finished an interview on the third floor.

It was a great learning opportunity for a young journalist to interpret for a veteran American colleague, whose works like Postville, The Oxford Project, and Inside the Writer's Mind: Writing Narrative Journalism have become must-reads for journalism students.

But his apparent disregard for punctuality was annoying, and the way he bargained with Tammy to get pearls for his wife - and my mother (I wanted a birthday present for her) - was more like a sharp-toothed customer than a professor.

Read more at China Daily

China Takes Lead in Buying Belgian Diamonds

ANTWERP, Belgium—This city's diamond district is recovering some of the shine it lost during the financial crisis by cashing in on a hungry new customer: China.

Exports of polished diamonds from Europe's diamond capital to China, including Hong Kong, increased 55% to $737 million in the first three months of 2010, the Antwerp World Diamond Centre said Tuesday.

hat makes China, for the first time, the biggest buyer of diamonds from Antwerp, knocking the U.S., traditionally its largest customer, into second place.

The booming Chinese market, fueled by the world's fastest-growing middle class, is proving a strong antidote to slipping sales in more established markets like the U.S. and Europe. A recent report by consultants KPMG forecasts China will become the world's largest diamond market next year.

Read more at The Wall Street Journal

A Conversation With Jan Chipchase and Frog Design's Chief Creative, Mark Rolston

How do you design for China, a country that hasn't had much exposure to design but whose citizens suddenly find themselves awash in new money?

On Monday, Frog Design, one of the country's biggest and most respected design firms, announced it had hired Jan Chipchase, one of the world's leading usability researchers and, for many years, one of the highest profile member of Nokia's design team.

It's a big move for Frog and Chipchase both. For Nokia, Chipchase has roamed the developing world, trying to figure out what sorts of cell phones the developing world needs. At Frog, he'll work from Shanghai, trying to understand the needs and wants of consumers in China, Frog's most hopeful frontier. The company opened an office there just three years ago, but Chinese clients already comprise 20% of its total business.

FastCompany.com spoke with Chipchase and Mark Rolston, Frog's Chief Creative Officer, about the challenges of designing for China, a country whose people haven't ever had much buying power before but who grow much richer with each passing year.

What’s going on that made Frog decide to invest in China and hire Jan?

Mark Rolston: We’ve been spending an incredible amount of time in Asia, and it’s going to be our fourth year in China. The first two years, it felt like we were just camping out. But the last two year, it’s exploded. We can tell that if we put in the right amount of energy, our Chinese business can be as big as the U.S.

Read more at Fast Company

Japan designer Yohji Yamamoto plans flagship store in China

Japanese fashion designer Yohji Yamamoto plans to open a flagship store in China in coming years as his brand, despite filing for bankruptcy last year, eyes Asia's growing class of luxury shoppers.

The iconic designer, famous for his black minimalist creations, said after a Tokyo show Thursday night that he plans to open new shops for his eponymous label in China, although he did not set a specific date.

The fashion house, founded in the 1970s, is undergoing restructuring with help from investment fund Integral Corporation after crumbling under a mountain of debt worth 67 million dollars amid the global economic crisis.

Read more at The Independent.

Gucci Learns To Speak Chinese

Company Plans To Invest Most Heavily In Asia-Pacific Region, With Particular Eye On China, In 2010

Gucci has grown rapidly in China, but does it risk overexposure? Many would say it has already spread itself too thin

The last decade has been good for Gucci in China, with the company going from a handful of boutiques in top-tier cities in 2000 to 30 locations in more than 20 cities today. Expansion has sped up in the last five years, with store locations popping up in second-and third-tier markets like Changchun, Wuhan and Shijiazhuang– cities that may be little known outside of China but have growing ranks of new wealthy with a strong appetite for luxury goods.

While this expansion has benefited the Gucci brand specifically, it has also been good for its parent company the Gucci Group, which owns companies like Yves St Laurent and Bottega Veneta. As Jing Daily pointed out last month, the growth of the Gucci brand, specifically, appears to follow the same roadmap employed by the Gucci Group for its other brands in the China market, such as Bottega Veneta, which recently opened its first second-tier city location in Nanjing.

Complete article at Jing Daily.

What Chinese Shoppers Want

Luxury goods makers find growth in China.

"Fashion fades, only style remains the same," says Jasper Liu, 26, summarizing his approach to shopping by quoting Coco Chanel.

Liu, a self-described "Shanghai Hipster," represents the nouveau riche of China. He reads English literature, watches European movies, drinks fine champagne and is a loyal patron of luxury retailers, namely Lanvin and Yves Saint Laurent.

The affection is mutual: fashion houses with global ambitions are courting Chinese consumers like Jasper, eager to learn how they spend, why they spend, and just how much they're willing to spend.

The answer: quite a lot if the quality and label are right. In a recent study by retail consulting firm Pao Principle, the average Chinese luxury consumer will spend roughly 11% of her income on luxury handbags alone. The group's favorite brands, in order of preference: Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Coach ( COH - news - people ), Chanel and Prada.

View complete article at FORBES.