Fashion brand HUI presented the Spring Summer 2023 Collection with a show held on September 25th, during the ongoing Milano Fashion Week. For the season, designer Hui Zhou Zhao was inspired by the legend of the Mother Butterfly that the Miao people – one of the oldest among the 56 ethnic groups known in China and the fifth in demographic order – have been telling since the dawn of time. The silhouettes are simple with an addition of The Mother Butterfly motif enlarged and printed on jersey and georgette, reproduced on jacquard sweaters, woven in luxurious fabrics (silk and brocade), and embroidered with micro sequins.
SPRING SUMMER 2023 COLLECTIONS
Transformation and rebirth, hope and courage, beauty in an absolute sense, but also the infinite variety of changes that time imposes on the body and soul. The butterfly ? a powerful symbol of metamorphosis in all cultures of the world ? is the very image of femininity. Hui Zhou Zhao, the lady of Chinese fashion who loves Italy and shows her collections in Milan, sees butterflies as another link between East and West. – from Hui
Transformed into an ancient maple tree, the Mother Butterfly (Moi Pong Mui Liu in the Miao language) falls in love with a bubble on the water of a pond. She becomes pregnant and lays 12 eggs that, after 12 years of incubation, give birth to 12 brothers including Jiang Yang, human ancestor of the Miao. The veins of maple wood and its totemic image, which is a woman’s head with the body and wings of a butterfly, often appear on ancient artifacts (embroidery, batik, musical instruments) that Hui Zhou Zhao collects and exhibits in the Centenary Fashion Museum of which she is the founder and curator. – from Hui
