Ma Yan

In the last semester of the third year, I decided to use my inheritance for myself and trace it back to the source. And I chose the tea culture that I have been interested in and influenced by since I was a child. And I was born in Anyang, the origin of the Shang Dynasty. The study of Warring States clothing and jade, I am very proud of these specific styles, which are rich in history and the meaning they contain. First of all, how to combine these things with people’s brains and Zen. People‘s understanding of life. The fusion process is like the tea leaves in your hands floating on the surface when you start to brew them, just like when people are just born, they don’t know a lot of things, and the whole person is light, but gradually your experience increases, and when you have experienced most of your life, you will gradually sink and absorb more knowledge and cognition of the world. Actually, including jade, it is also a process of sand slowly accumulating and settling on the seabed through the changes of the sun, moon and weather. From turbid small particles gradually becoming transparent, not everyone can turn into a green colour, because not all jades are green, they are purple, pink, white, so just like us humans, not everyone is the same, and you are the most special one.

In this collection I used black tea instead of coloured dye, a very healthy and natural environmentally friendly state to save all my fabrics, and in the process of stewing it, I can get some very special unnatural colors, which makes the color look less uniform, more like hand-made, adding a playful and unique sense of design. And in this way, in the wonderful process, each piece can be a special piece of clothing, because its dipping progress is not the same, and some marks look like wrinkles, but in fact they are not marks, but the color is not wrinkled during the dyeing process, so it will look like this piece of clothing has been made old, so it can also be connected, like I am making a nostalgic memory.

I would like to protect the environment and be sustainable, so I used a lot of high-quality and expensive materials that are more environmentally friendly to the earth, such as silk. Its production process and production technology come from the silkworm that is born in our precious world. During the design process, I encountered some big challenges because I often design too many elements, and when I put them on a set of clothes, it looks like a performance costume, not a fashionable dress that can be worn every day. Therefore, I was very distressed and reduced a lot of designs. In my clothes, the result is very good, and I am very happy. And this time I tried some of my favourite Chinese stand-up collar Zhongshan suit tailoring and Pipa sleeves with long water sleeves, as well as the one-piece cutting method in tailoring. For example, my shirts are all cut from an incomplete piece, and the front and back parts are not spliced.

In order for me to copy the idea of jade, “a stone” on a cloth like its reflection, and smaller on “water”, tea. I tried to use liquid silicone to simulate the transparent and crystal-clear feeling of the jade room, put it on my pants, and wanted to make the jade raw stone, the cut part is the jade shining with green light, and the outer skin is just an ordinary and inconspicuous stone appearance. And I am quite satisfied with the result. Although it takes a long time, I need to use a pin to poke every detail, and then stir the liquid slowly and patiently, and apply it on top of the folds.

I hope people can feel comfortable and relaxed. Returning to the original nature of clothes is simple and natural in comfort. This is the message I want to convey through this series.