First lady fashion: the rise and rise of Peng Liyuan's favourite designer

Few mainlanders had heard of the home-grown designer brand Exception until first lady Peng Liyuan grabbed headlines by wearing a sophisticated black coat and handbag by the company during her maiden overseas trip with President Xi Jinping two years ago. Peng's preference for domestic designer brands has been a great encouragement for China's apparel industry, which largely consists of agents for foreign brands and companies dedicated to copying Western lines. But Mao Jihong, president of Mixmind Art & Design, which owns Exception, said that as long as the industry remained overwhelmed by Western aesthetics and values China would face a long haul to build its own global fashion brands. Mao said Exception won the hearts of high-profile figures by keeping an independent mind and aesthetic. And for now, Exception is living up to its name. With three brands and about 150 stores nationwide, Mixmind - established by Mao and his former wife Ma Ke in 1996 - has grown in public profile over the past couple of years since Peng put it firmly in the limelight. Despite this, the firm has deliberately kept a low profile and avoided revealing details of the personal lives of state leaders' families, always a sensitive topic on the mainland. Mao was happy to discuss most details about his company - but certainly not his best-known client - in his interview with the South China Morning Post. The company, however, is on the record as saying that Peng had been a VIP customer for more than a decade, and that part of her wardrobe for state visits was made jointly with another brand belonging to Ma, one of the country's most successful designers in the last two decades. "When I first visited Guangdong more than 20 years ago, it already had a strong garment wholesaling industry. People loved clothes made in Guangdong," he said. "But it didn't need designers at all, just patterns." Things had not improved much since then, he said. "Our really good clothing handiwork was lost in the first three decades of reform and opening up," he said. "Everyone is working on low-end brands for others, because we are following the requirements for quality and aesthetics set by Westerners." Now a familiar name at home, especially among young consumers, Exception was eyeing international markets, including New York, Paris, London and Tokyo, to expand international recognition of an Eastern fashion aesthetic, Mao said. He did not detail how the company planned to enter these markets, saying he was more interested in how Chinese fashion was presented overseas than the number of shops opened. According to the World Intellectual Property Organisation, Chinese garment manufacturers led the world for trademark applications in 2013. But as Chinese-made clothes flooded the world, there were few globally recognised players among them. Fast-fashion brands have become very popular among the young, and copies of clothes worn by Western pop stars have become hits on Taobao, the mainland's biggest online shopping platform. But Mao said these trends didn't exert any pressure on him: "It's been nearly 20 years since my company was established. I didn't see much difficulty during that time … The point is how to be myself in this environment." Making money was not the only goal for his business, he added. "It's also very important that the industry grows in a healthy way," said Mao, who appears to combine the acumen of a businessman with the temperament of an artist. Mao, 46, majored in art at a university in Hunan and later attended the Beijing Institute of Fashion Technology. He moved to Guangzhou to start Exception in the early 1990s. Raised in a well-off family in a revolutionary area - Pingjiang county in Hunan - Mao was particularly enthusiastic about art as a teenager, according to a local media report in 2008, when both he and his company were still relatively obscure. But even then, Peng, as the vice-president's wife, was wearing his designs. The year 2008 was a turning point for Mao, who had seldom appeared in the media. Few in the press had noticed that Mixmind had been growing quickly for some years. Sales reached 100 million yuan (HK$126 million) in 2001, and the following year it was the only mainland brand invited to the 2002 Prêt à Porter Paris fashion show . Aiming to be a global pioneer for Chinese fashion brands, Mixmind's "dream" was to "create clothes, create our own values and lifestyle", Mao said. What set the brand apart was that everything was done in-house, from selecting fabric to designing patterns. Described as a leading independent Chinese label that stands out in an industry dominated by Western copycats, Exception has encountered its own imitators since fashion-savvy bloggers spotted Peng wearing the brand. "Anything labelled as Exception on Taobao is fake," Mao said.

First lady fashion: the rise and rise of Peng Liyuan's favourite designer

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}The Exception brand grew steadily but flew under the media radar until its very public exposure by first lady Peng Liyuan

The Exception brand grew steadily but flew under the media radar until its very public exposure by first lady Peng Liyuan