Divine Diva
After I left the most stylish magazine in China, I ran into a kind of chaotic and do-not-know-why-so-busy status. Today I open a vintage Shun Pao (a very popular weekly in Shanghai) casually, which might be from my college age. I find a top list of Shanghai fashion authority. This makes me feel the Shun Pao even looked like New York Magazine or Tatler’s localization version. It is so close to your life that you can step into this fashionable aura. Shanghai shows a little potential to becoming a fashion capital in this small page. So I get interested and start reading this article word by word. Some names on this list are still hotshot in town, such as a PR maven whose business is getting bigger; a fashion editor who have quit her job turn into another industry and a stylist never styling again since her marriage. Of course, more names are just disappeared, like they never have been showed on the list.
Suddenly, a familiar name jumps into my vision, Shaway Yeh, she was my boss when I still working for the most stylish magazine. She had got many titles before that, like a major force behind Prada China and an ex-editor-in-chief of Vogue China. She is a legendary woman, the idol we all worship a lot in the company. In China, she has a number of loyal fans who will buy every issue of Modern Weekly just want to read her editor’s letter.(She called it Arbiter) The interview of her is very short but still you can tell from it that she is much more cutting edge than any other people on the list. When all the so-called fashionista talking about their dreaming bag are Chanel 2.55 or something Louis Vuitton, Yeh is already appreciate Veronique Branquinho’s collection. At that time, people in Chinese fashion media hardly knew Antwerp Six.
She is a diva who has many stories. It is said in the past, she would be wearing a hollow leather dress with a red fox tail. On the Arbiter’s column, she wears wicked feathers on her head. She talks about how she likes to DIY jewelry with a sense of surreal, once she made a wig into a brooch. Also she probably is one of the first people who prefer the vintage clothing. When I worked with her, her dress was not that exaggerated, but still had a strong feeling of Shaway Yeh. She totally gets her own style. She always wore some fancy pattern dress; we all know it might be some big brand or great designers’ work. But when it had been put on, the brand’s DNA turned into hers immediately. You may say she is a Queen, but her iPhone case covered with all rhinestones reveals the secret of her lovely personality. Perhaps she wants to know why those Harajuku or 90′s girls obsessing with the strange feeling Kawaii, I guess.
Though she born in Taiwan and has spent many years working in mainland China, she still a New Yorker deep inside her heart. When she was 21 years old she went to NYU to learn “performance theory”. You have to admit that was really a strange choice at that time. The hippy spirit of NYU, the yuppie lifestyle of uptown and the artistic environment downtown made her a New Yorker’s soul. She went to the Price Street to check out the unique galleries and stores in the daytime and go to Meat Packing District to see the drag queen shows in Jackie Sixty Club at night. She loved the city so much but decided to come back to China. “New York city is fascinating but it has been done. It’s past and now. I want to discover the future—which is in China.” She always has a strong vision of future, and is eager to chase what is next. That’s a key of all the people who work in media industry. Sometimes a few fashion editors like to look back, cherishing the golden old times. But like Diana Vreeland, who said “I loathe nostalgia” in her autobiography, Yeh hates to review the past again and again, instead she devotes herself in exploring the new talent and fresh faces both in China and around the world. And when I was working with her, she always sent me the first hand and about-to-happen news. You have to keep up with her step closely which maybe a little exhausting but really worthy, it can help a young editor to know what topic should follow and how to make the topic become next big thing. Still, she interviews and writes the article herself which is really rare for those chief-editors in China. Her recent interviews with Yayoi Kusama and Giorgio Armani can be read as a perfect example for those journalism students even many entry-level editors.
Fashion to her may not be an option right now. She is more like an artist or a exhibition curator. When she worked for Prada as a PR consultant, she already held a skirt-exhibition in Shanghai Peace Hotel. It was 2005, many luxury brands were busy in spreading their sales network in China. An artistic exhibition made Prada stand out. Actually, Yeh is just like Miuccia Prada, low-key, beautiful and full of wisdom. Then she held a Chinese young designers exhibition with Nicola Formichetti in New York last year during the fashion week (Then moved to Lane Crawford Beijing). It was a tough work but she nailed it. New York fashion circle started to notice the Chinese force at the first time. It was different from “Vogue Talented Corner” or something else. Behind her is not a media tycoon like Conde Nast but a rising local media group. These all efforts were just because of her interest and passion to show the people living in the perfect now what is the future.
Of course everybody wants to be in Vogue, the No.1 fashion bible around the world. Yeh was the ex-chief-editor of Vogue China. You can imagine how fancy the position was: the top 1 fashion authority, high payment, access to the top fashion circle, front row of every single fashion show and a bunch of production budget. These are all extreme allure you can’t resist. But Yeh can, since the period before launch was too long and the UK headquarter had too much controlling, she left Vogue decisively only because she didn’t want to waste her life. Now she is much freer, she can do anything she wants, like interviewing artist or just be one. She even wrote an article against the whole “Fashion Night Out” thing. “Shopping to save the fashion industry is logically wrong. We need to think more deeply to change the whole industry. A fashion magazine should be sober to inspire people not just make them spend money.” It is very brave to tell the truth especially in the window-dressing industry. And only Yeh keeps talking like this that makes her a divine diva, the one, the only.Type your post
(Originally posted on 06/25/2012)
