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Beijing Winter Olympics 2022
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Supporting staff will wear designs that incorporate “traditional Tang dynasty fabrics and other traditional Chinese cultural elements”. Photo: Beijing2022/Twitter

Beijing 2022: ‘unbearably ugly’ Chinese uniforms go viral as social media users mock victory ceremony designs

  • The costumes debuted in a post on the organising committee’s Weibo account, gaining more than 366,000 likes and 17,000 comments
  • One commentator said they hadn’t ‘seen such old-school designs on garments for years, even my mother wouldn’t dress like this’

The official designs for the Beijing Olympics’ medal ceremonies have been unveiled by organisers, prompting widespread criticism among Chinese online users who described the costumes to be worn by staff as “unbearably ugly”.

The costumes debuted in a post on the organising committee’s Weibo, a Chinese Twitter-like online networking tool, gaining more than 366,000 likes and 17,000 comments.

As athletes receive their medals, supporting staff will be wearing one of these three different designs that incorporate “traditional Tang dynasty fabrics and other traditional Chinese cultural elements,” the organisers wrote.

Chinese online users described the costumes to be worn by staff as “unbearably ugly”. Photo: SCMP

Yet comments flooded under the post as netizens expressed their distaste for the design of the costumes.

One netizen commented: “I haven’t seen such old-school designs on garments for years, even my mother wouldn’t dress like this.” The comment received 24,000 likes from other users.

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“I really don’t understand! Why are this year’s designs so inadequate? The athlete uniforms and competition uniforms also leave me speechless,” another netizen noted. This comment received more than 7,000 likes.

The three designs, titled “Lucky Snow and Cloud”, “Great Landscape” and “Flying Snow in Tang dynasty”, feature variations on the main colours of bright red and blue, with details in traditional style “cross collars” and prints of snow and mountain motifs.

The costumes incorporate traditional Chinese craft, such as embroidery and landscape painting techniques, with “core graphic elements” of the games in its production. Line graphics of hills and snowflake-shaped prints will be featured along with rolling mountainscapes evoking textures of a tapestry.

Each set includes jackets, hats, gloves, boots, and “self-heating thermal underwear”.

The IOC confirmed these designs, along with designs for the podium and memorabilia, on Tuesday.

“The dress highlights Chinese charm, with modern and simple design techniques,” the committee wrote in a press release.

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However, some Chinese netizens disagreed with the presentation of Chinese elements.

“[This is] Chinese style that isn’t Chinese, ethnic style that isn’t ethnic,” a commenter wrote.

“If the organising committee does not pay attention to a lot of details, the Chinese people will eventually be criticised to death. After all, this is the first time the country has stood in front of the world’s cameras since the outbreak,” another commenter wrote.

“The mainstream media of every country in the world will report this Winter Games. For the Olympic Games, the designs of the costumes and landscapes must be meticulously designed, please realise the gravity of this issue.”

Different sets will be worn in snow and ice competition venues, as well as the Beijing Medals Plaza, which is a newly added venue specifically for prize presentation and “cultural exhibitions”.

This reflects Beijing’s new arrangement to divide victory ceremonies into two parts – a “souvenir ceremony” at the competition venue, and a more traditional ceremony at the Beijing Medals Plaza.

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