The Rebel Returns
Han Feng's designs were a hit in New York City. Now they're taking off in Shanghai
By Hannah Beech/Shanghai

Spring 2005 Style & Design
WHEN HAN FENG was growing up in China during the 1960s and '70s, everyone wore the same three colors: army green, navy blue and black. It was a country where there was no need for Technicolor, only endless variations on a drab theme. Today, walking down Shanghai's neon-emblazoned streets, the 42-year-old designer, who recently returned home after nearly two decades abroad, marvels at the multitude of hues that have bloomed. "I love designing with pure, bright colors because I didn't experience them as a child," she says. "But now you can find everything in China."

And more. Chinese scientists, engineers and bankers who had once fled their communist motherland are returning in droves to make their fortunes. Now Han, whose designs Westerners label exotic and Easterners see as ultramodern, wants to bring home a fashion revolution as well. "We have entered the Chinese century," she says, "and I want to be a part of it." At first, Han was worried whether her gauzy creations, which have graced the likes of Gwyneth Paltrow and Nicole Kidman, would resonate in China. "People my age grew up with everyone wearing the same uniform, a Mao suit," she says. "I'm amazed at how much people want style now. [They] are experimenting in what it's like to be free, and they will try anything."

That urge to experiment struck Han several decades before most of her fellow Chinese. She grew up in Hangzhou, west of Shanghai, where she studied graphic design at the local art institute. Han did well academically but quickly became a self-described black sheep. "I wanted to learn, not copy," she says. "My teachers didn't understand that."

In 1985 Han moved to New York City, where she honed her design sense as a saleswoman at Bloomingdale's. Four years later, Han was selling her trademark pleated scarves out of her apartment and soon thereafter opened a showroom with everything from her eponymous womenswear to Asian-influenced furniture. Along the way, Han morphed into a lifestyle doyenne, cooking a Chinese New Year's feast on Martha Stewart's TV show and decorating a loft that has been showcased in décor magazines. Her latest project is designing costumes for a production of Madame Butterfly opening in London this fall. Her larger goal, though, is to reorient herself from West back to East. Last May, Han opened her first Shanghai boutique, in a sleek, Barneys-like space she shares with designers such as Vivienne Tam and Yohji Yamamoto. She spends much of her time in Shanghai, sourcing interesting materials and documenting traditional Chinese crafts like silkmaking, beadwork and embroidery.

As Chinese apparel floods the world, some Western manufacturers doubt the quality can match that of European workshops. But given the country's recent trajectory, it may not be long before MADE IN CHINA means far more than cheap mass merchandise. And when it does, Han Feng will be leading the way. "Maybe I'll be China's Martha Stewart," she jokes.

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