If anybody understands who their customer is, it’s Chinese-born designer Huishan Zhang. He tends to them like a shepherd.
Of course, the Huishan Zhang woman is no sheep but is perhaps more a wolf in extravagantly embroidered clothing.
This season was inspired by Roger Kumble’s 1999 film “Cruel Intentions” starring a host of glamorous women such as Sarah Michelle Gellar, Reese Witherspoon, Selma Blair and Christine Baranski.
The ‘90s cult classic is being reimagined as a musical at The Other Palace theater in London next year.
“I watched it a long time ago, but I never really reiterated how good it actually is until this time, when the design director of my studio said it’s his all-time favorite film. I will always find a good excuse to watch something with my team,” Zhang said.
The collection focuses on feelings, more specifically what adulthood feels like to those growing up and what youthfulness means to those reminiscing. The designer chose two models, different in age, who both walked in his spring 2024 show earlier this year, to illustrate this point.
The opening look was a denim set: an oversize bomber-style jacket with double stitch seams paired with a long embroidered skirt. The jacket was for day and the skirt was for night.
Zhang revealed that denim is a growing category for the business, along with his sleek tailoring.
The flirty slipdresses were reminiscent of Gellar’s character, Kathryn Merteuil; the innocent broderie anglaise pieces nodded to Witherspoon’s Annette Hargrove, the virgin daughter of the new headmaster at the private school they all attend; the laissez-faire cardigans touched on Blair’s airy-fairy character Cecile Caldwell, whose mother, Bunny, played by Baranski, would snap up the boucle jackets and qipao dresses with their shiny mandarin collars and body-hugging shapes.