Empress' clothes 'show rise of women in China's last dynasty'

A rare dress belonging to an empress and embodying the rise of women in imperial China's last dynasty has gone on display in the Museum of History.

Empress Longyu's dark blue silk bridal surcoat challenged the Qing dynasty's rigorous patriarchal attire system with its eight dragon-phoenix roundels.

The dress is part of an exhibition of clothing from the dynasty featuring more than 130 costumes selected from the 100,000-piece textile collection of the Palace Museum in Beijing.

"Only emperors could use dragon patterns during the Qing dynasty. But this surcoat was manufactured at the time Empress Dowager Cixi was in power," said Ruan Weiping, an associate research fellow at the Palace Museum.

"The dress showed the conflict between the power of women and the imperial authority."

A third of the items are on public display for the first time, including a blue surcoat of Emperor Kangxi and a coloured sketch of a festive robe on silk. More than 70 of the items on display have never been shown outside the mainland.

Museum of History curator Ang Yee said the exhibition was the largest of its kind in Hong Kong. "It has the largest number of items, and the most diverse as well," she said.