Materials

Silk dyed with the juice of the dye yam and cured under river mud and sun, in the old way of Shunde, Guangdong. The face turns a deep lacquered black, the back a warm brown, and it softens and deepens with every year of wear.

A woven silk brocade named for the Song dynasty: fine, flat and supple, with its pattern woven into the cloth rather than printed on it. Counted among China’s great brocades.

A pile woven of silk. Its dark surface absorbs and returns light as the wearer moves, giving a piece an understated depth.

A pattern woven into the silk itself, so that bamboo or cloud rises quietly from the surface only as the light turns across it.

An open, airy weave, light as smoke, for pieces that should move before the body does.

The house takes ancient court embroidery as its spine. Every motif is worked by professional embroiderers, thread by thread, after the cloth is made.

Each stitch is guided by the embroiderer’s own hands as the cloth is moved beneath the needle, which gives the line its living, irregular grace.

Pearls and beads sewn on one at a time, so that a piece catches the light in points rather than in a sheen.

Each garment is finished by a single master from start to end. Depending on the work, that can take months.