7 of Fan Bingbing’s favourite fashion designers: from striking red carpet looks by Louis Vuitton, Dolce & Gabbana and Valentino, to regal Christopher Bu gowns highlighting her Chinese heritage
The queen of the red carpet is back!
After five years spent away from the limelight, Chinese film star Fan Bingbing rocked up to the 2023 Academy Awards in a mesmerising silver-sequinned couture gown with dramatic green bow-like sleeves by Tony Ward. She completed the look with Lorraine Schwartz emerald jewels and a silver clutch.
Ever the fashionista, the X-Men: Days of Future Past and Iron Man 3 star turns heads practically everywhere she goes. Let’s take a look at her best looks from her favourite fashion designers over the years:
1. Louis Vuitton
Louis Vuitton has perhaps contributed the most to Fan’s fashion transformation, thanks to her role as the former face of the French label in the early 2010s. She would often appear in the front rows of fashion shows and at opening ceremonies wearing the brand’s chic dresses.
At Paris Fashion Week in 2012, she wore a white floral-lace dress with a matching lace hat and looked every inch the movie starlet.
She also donned a multicoloured print resort maxi at a Les Parfums Louis Vuitton Shanghai event in 2017.
Then at a 2017 Louis Vuitton x Jeff Koons collaboration dinner, the A-list actress wore a shimmering sheer black gown with silver polka dots, complemented with one of the brand’s own sling bags.
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2. Valentino
Pink seems to be Fan’s favourite colour from Italian fashion house Valentino.
At the premiere of her film Chongqing Blues at the 2010 Cannes Film Festival, Fan chose a charming pink gown with delicate ruffles cascading down her skirt. Six years later she wore this cute pink Valentino set – a flower-embroidered coat, tie neck blouse and trousers – at Paris Fashion Week, and a blush shirt dress at Valentino’s I Love Spike exhibition in Beijing a year later.
Red seems to be the other Valentino hue she favours most, from the lace dress with matching clutch she sported at the brand’s 50th Anniversary party in 2012, to the bold, off-the-shoulder floor-length gown she wore to The Beguiled premiere at the 2017 Cannes Film Festival.
3. Elie Saab
At her Cannes Film Festival debut in 2010, Fan looked stunning in a white strapless Elie Saab lace gown with a sweetheart neckline, and the brand seems to have become one of her favourite designers on the red carpet since then.
Other memorable Elie Saab moments at Cannes included a nude shimmering lace gown with a matching cape in 2012 and a light blue silk-chiffon floor-length dress, also with a cape (pictured above) in 2017.
She also wowed onlookers at the 2017 Asian Film Awards when she won best actress for I Am Not Madame Bovary in an Elie Saab Couture embellished blue jumpsuit that featured a long open skirt
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4. Ralph & Russo
Ralph & Russo’s sophisticated gowns make up some of Fan’s best looks. One of them was this pale pink off-the-shoulder dress with green embroidered Chinese floral motifs from the 2015 Cannes Film Festival. Its cape sleeves flow into a long train, and looked elegant paired with Fan’s Chopard green earrings.
At the premiere of her film Lady of the Dynasty that same year, Fan once again impressed style watchers in this delicate guipure lace and embroidered glass bead gown complete with silk-crepe cape. Her other noteworthy Ralph & Russo moments include a tassel-tiered gown with embellished crystals at the 2017 Bazaar Star charity night in Beijing, and a sexy yet classy black gown with high split at the 2020 Huading Awards.
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5. Dolce & Gabbana
For important occasions like introducing her new films, Fan often picks bold pattern print dresses from Dolce & Gabbana. She opted for a delightful blossom red rose dress from D&G’s autumn 2015 collection at a press conference for her film Lady of the Dynasty, for example.
In 2016, she looked delightful in this bold, cat-print white dress at Win The World’s press conference in Shanghai. A few years earlier, she had also donned a similarly bold floral-print long-sleeved blouse and a face-print A-line skirt from D&G’s Sicily-inspired spring 2013 collection while promoting her film One Night Surprise.
6. Atelier Versace
Fan has been seen in several Atelier Versace outfits over the years, such as this blue-grey silk chiffon gown at the closing ceremony of the 2017 Cannes Film Festival. In fact her love affair with the Italian house began a while ago, since she was also seen wearing a ruffled ombre purple strapless gown at The Artist premiere in 2011 at the Cannes Film Festival, and the label’s quirky yellow minidress with silver metallic panel at a Versace Haute Couture show in 2013.
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7. Christopher Bu
When Fan wants to highlight her Chinese heritage, she places her trust in Chinese designer Christopher Bu. Who could forget the “watercolour painting” strapless gown that she wore to the premiere of Moonrise Kingdom at the 2012 Cannes Film Festival for starters?
Her regal “queen look” for the 2015 Met Gala saw her stalking the red carpet in a gorgeous gold-sequinned column gown and patterned dark green cape (pictured above). Fittingly, the theme was “China: Through the Looking Glass”.
Then, just last month, she attended the Berlin Film Festival to introduce her latest film Green Night in an elegant white cheongsam-style gown by the Chinese designer, complete with split sleeves featuring sparkling dark blue floral patterns.
- Chinese superstar Fan Bingbing was recently spotted at the Oscars in a mesmerising Tony Ward couture gown, but she also counts Louis Vuitton, Valentino, Dolce & Gabbana and Atelier Versace as faves
- The X-Men: Days of Future Past actress promoted her latest film Green Night in a Christopher Bu cheongsam, but who can forget the Ralph & Rosso gown she wore to the Lady of the Dynasty premiere?