A Chinese feeling next to the skin

I returned home with a custom-made silk qipao in my luggage after staying in Beijing for two weeks this summer. As I hung that beautiful dress up in the wardrobe, I realised that I had done exactly the same thing in my previous trips to the mainland: I had a qipao (a formal version of a cheongsam) made in Hangzhou last year, and another in Shanghai two years before.

Cultural critics suggest that clothing can signify one's cultural identity. I could not help but suspect that my tendency to collect these dresses from the mainland - a ritualistic behaviour I have developed since studying abroad a decade ago - reflects an underlying desire to express and reinforce my Chinese identity. But I am not alone.

Since actress Maggie Cheung wore her stunning qipao in the movie In the Mood for Love in 2000, the dress has become a much-sought item by young women in Hong Kong and on the mainland. Gray-haired qipao tailors suddenly found their business booming, and CCTV made a programme about it, citing a revival of national culture.

Yet, it's hardly legitimate to call the qipao a product of Chinese culture. It was adapted from a dress worn by Manchu women, in the brief period between the Qing dynasty's downfall in 1911 and the rise of the People's Republic. With the influx of novel goods and ideas from abroad during that period, women became brave enough to show their bare arms and curvy figures. The qipao was transformed from its original form - a loosely fitting dress hanging strait down - to a body-hugging outfit. But it was quickly replaced by the unisex and colourless Mao suit of socialist China.

In the early 20th century, the qipao remained a dress for urban and well-to-do women. But no Chinese women in rice fields or factories have been seen in them. Clearly, the majority of Chinese women could not afford to have - or dare to wear - this slender dress with the high cuts on both sides.

Misleading though it may be, the qipao has been widely accepted as a Chinese national costume by people in and outside the country. The attraction, as the CCTV programme suggested, lies in the qipao's contradiction between exposure and concealment. It reveals a woman's body curves, yet it refuses to show too much skin. Maybe the qipao projects the mystique of beauty, just like the mystery of China's rise: the combination of a free market and socialism is a paradox, thus interesting.