Xi Jinping's Chinese dress looks at cultural self-confidence from the history of Chinese tunic

Chinese President Xi Jinping recently visited Spain, and his "Chinese dress" turned out to be a highlight. China has a long history. Which dynasty and which generation of clothing can be regarded as "national clothes"? After Xi Jinping took office, the Chinese dress seems to have come to a conclusion.

This Chinese-style garment worn by Xi Jinping features 3 concealed pockets, with only the left chest pocket on the upper body, no pocket cover, and a kerchief, with hidden buttons on the front and embroidered sides.

This coat is not the first time Xi Jinping has worn it on foreign affairs occasions. The reason why this time attracted so much attention is that it has a lot to do with the Chinese officials who accompanied the Chinese officials in almost the same dress and attended the welcome dinner hosted by King Felipe VI of Spain.

Some media even exclaimed that they were all wearing "Mao's Suit" (Mao's Suit).

Chinese tunic suit

The so-called "mao suit" is what the Chinese call "Chinese tunic suit". As the name suggests, tunic suits originated from Sun Yat-sen. Sun Yat-sen is hailed as the pioneer of modern Chinese revolution in China, and is respected as "Father of the Nation" in Taiwan.

The collar of this coat is a figure-eight-shaped lapel, the front has a single row of five buttons and four pockets with flaps, and there are three buttons on the cuffs.

There have been two theories about the origin of tunic suits over the years. One said that Sun Yat-sen combined the characteristics of Japanese school uniforms and military uniforms, designed and transformed them together with tailors; another said that the Chinese tunic was designed by Huang Longsheng, an overseas Chinese tailor in Vietnam, who helped Sun Yat-sen.

The Chinese tunic suit, which has a history of nearly a hundred years, has been added with many political meanings in the modern history of China's abolition of monarchy, warlord melee and the civil war between the Kuomintang and the Communist Party. The five buttons on the front represent Sun Yat-sen's five-power constitution theory, and so on.

In any case, tunic suits did appear at many important moments in China's modern history: in 1949, when Mao Zedong announced the founding of the People's Republic of China, he wore a tunic suit; in 1979, Deng Xiaoping visited the United States to meet with President Carter and also wore a tunic suit. In the 1960s and 1970s, most of the hundreds of millions of Chinese adult men wore Chinese tunic suits.

After the 1980s, as China opened up and integrated into the world, suits and other fashions gradually became popular. Although tunic suits have gradually withdrawn from people's daily life among the people, even Chinese officials and civil servants have given up tunic suits in formal occasions and changed to suits. However, Chinese national leaders are still used to wearing Chinese tunic suits when attending major domestic and foreign events.

In February 2016, some people proposed before the Chinese People's Congress and CPPCC meeting that the Zhongshan suit should be designated as China's "national formal dress."

Chinese dress

Comparing the traditional Chinese tunic suit with Xi Jinping's "Chinese dress", the difference between the two is obvious.

In 2014, Xi Jinping wore this "Chinese dress" when attending the state banquet held by King Philip of Belgium.

At that time, the Chinese official media "People's Daily" published an article on this, saying that Xi Jinping's dress resembles a tunic suit, but is different from the traditional tunic suit. Instead, it has improved the key parts of the tunic suit. It not only retains the tradition of Chinese clothing, but also adopts it. Some elements of the suit: abandon the lapels, style buckles, and bright buckles of the tunic suit, and use 3 concealed pockets, with only the left chest pocket on the upper body, no pocket cover, and a kerchief.

People in the diplomatic community believe that, for a long time, Chinese leaders and diplomats have no rules to follow in addition to the tunic suit on diplomatic etiquette occasions. However, judging from the fact that Chinese officials generally wear "Chinese-style dresses" this time, Chinese tunic suits and suits no longer have their previous status. The "Chinese dress" pioneered by Xi Jinping has become a model for Chinese officials to dress on major international formal occasions.

Lu Peixin, the former director of the Protocol Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of China, told the Chinese media that Xi Jinping wore Chinese clothes to attend formal diplomatic occasions, which fully demonstrated the grace of Chinese culture and also reflected China's diplomatic confidence.

Observers have noticed that Xi Jinping's Chinese dress has many similarities with one of the traditional Indian dresses, the "Nehru coat", but the embroidery on the chest and the Chinese concealed button are the most obvious differences between the two.

Cultural confidence

China's 40 years of economic reform and opening up have experienced social upheavals that are rare in the world, and the changes during this period are also reflected in the dressing style of Chinese officials.

At the beginning of the reform and opening up, Chinese leaders began to change the style of all tunic suits in public activities and began to wear jackets and suits.

In the 1980s, when Hu Yaobang and Zhao Ziyang were in power, they vigorously promoted opening up to the West. Leaders practiced wearing suits and tunic suits gradually declined.

For a time tunic suits seemed to be a symbol of "Leftism" and "conservation", and suits became a symbol of "Westernization" and "openness". In the process of replacing Chinese tunic suits with suits, there are people wearing all kinds of Chinese suits in the street pool tables or fields in China's urban and rural areas for entertainment or work.

It is worth mentioning that the National Government, founded by Sun Yat-sen nearly a hundred years ago, once designated Zhongshan as a uniform uniform. In February 1936, the President of the Republic of China, Chiang Kai-shek, ordered all civil servants to wear uniform uniforms in the style of Chinese tunic.

Times have changed, and even the Kuomintang leaders who respect Sun Yat-sen as the "father of the nation" rarely wear Chinese tunic suits in Taiwan. In 2012, when the ruling Kuomintang president Ma Ying-jeou was running for re-election, he wore a white Chinese costume to shoot a campaign propaganda film, which became a topic of Chinese media reports. In fact, that coat is not strictly a Chinese tunic suit, but its style is very similar to Xi Jinping's Chinese dress.

After Xi Jinping came to power, he advocated the "Chinese Dream" of national rejuvenation. This Chinese-style dress is the return of Chinese people from tunic to suit and then to Chinese-style clothing on grand formal occasions for a century.