Innovative, polished beyond belief and with astounding construction, the Asian designers featured at the Fashion Hong Kong 2017 show are taking New York Fashion Week by storm.  

Cynthia & Xiao

Cynthia & Xiao’s F/W 2017 presentation, “Little Emperor: The Rabbit and The Tiger,”  was the best out of the three designers who presented at the Fashion Hong Kong show. Not only were the looks fresh and fashion-forward, but the level of craftsmanship and finish on each piece was astounding. And this was not by some fluke — Cynthia Mak has worked for storied fashion houses like Alexander McQueen, Vivienne Westwood, Preen by Thornton and Roksanda Illincic,  and Xiao Xiao has studied and practiced in knitwear and textile construction and design. Put the two together and it makes for a very unusual but successful marriage of design, wearability and craftsmanship. The lookbook for the show stated that the two, “created their own in-house hand-loomed knits to be incorporated [into the show].” Their use of age-old techniques coupled with their pared down aesthetic (with a subtle nods to symbolic Chinese artistry/history) made for a very successful and interesting collection.

Harrison Wong

Harrison Wong’s F/W 2017 presentation, “Modern Monastic,” was all about the inspiration of monastic robes — specifically, the traditional versus stark modernity that a robe can evoke. Whilst this explanation behind the presentation is unique and clearly presents a core philosophy of timelessness in the work, it was not translated well into the physical pieces. The completely monochromatic pieces felt like they could be in an Alexander Wang or Rick Owens show. They were very well constructed, but not as innovative as the idea behind them.    

Polly Ho

Polly Ho’s Loom Loop presentation showed interesting and original textiles, but the clothes they made were not as intriguing. The textiles and fabrics were rich with ancient Chinese folklore that made you want to look at them for hours, but the garments themselves were really just fabric draped over the models. The pieces weren’t ill-fitting enough to be considered part of the oversized trend, yet not tailored enough to fit well.

Email Jacob Soley at [email protected].