Taiwanese ignore ban on fashions

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 32848, 23 February 1972, Page 6

Taiwanese ignore ban on fashions

(By LIONEL TSAI, through N.Z.P.A.-Reuter) TAIPEI (Taiwan), February 22. Hot pants, bell-bottom trousers, and micro-miniskirts appear to have won the day in Taipei, despite a police campaign against sexy fashion.

implementing a ban announced last year on “hippi culture,” the police clamped down on long hair, beards, and Western fashions. The Commissioner of Police ordered his men to visit entertainers to make sure there was no violation of the ban, and television companies were told to rid their programmes of “undesirable” hair styles and fashions. In spite of this, fashionconscious Chinese girls are increasingly being seen in micro-minis, hot pants, and bell-bottoms.

Even the wives and daughters of police officers are wearing the new fashions, which may explain why the ban is not working. Cheong-sams While on the Chinese mainland, shapeless “unisex” blue cotton trousers and jackets are the order of the day, on Taiwan the traditional Chinese cheong-sam has been replaced by the “mini-cheong”—an updated version of the high-necked, knee-length dress still worn by conservative Chinese women.

A rise in Taiwan’s living standards has also boosted Wfstem styles. A police officer said privately: “It is evident from the fashions displayed by these young women that our standard of living is changing rapidly.” ■ A conductress on one of Taipei’s buses said she spends nearly half her salary on clothes. But the average family will budget its income to about one-quarter for clothing. One by-product of the fashion industry has been the proliferation of professional models. Taipei alone has approximately 50 models, earning up to $2lO a month. These models and, of course, women in show business, spend most of their earnings on clothes, but they have yet to reach a stage where they could be referred to as “trendsetters.”

Fashions created locally are disdained by the people,

as they still feel that the new styles should come from the West. Western trends are introduced mainly by girls in show business. The moment a new style is worn by a singer, for example, it will quickly spread to college students and working girls. Contributory

Magazines, television, and fashion shows have been major contributory factors in bringing to Taiwan new trends from the Western world.

But now a lot of thought is being given to modernising traditional Chinese fashions, one result being the introduction of the “minicheong.” A noted dress designer in Taipei, Miss Kuo Hsin-Ying, said: “We designers follow foreign trends and make slight alterations to adapt them to Chinese figures and customs. But Paris, Rome, and New York are likely to remain authorities for new fashions because the people of Taiwan, like those of Japan, tend to follow the styles set in the West rather than those set their own country.