Runway to success

She has shared the stage with a Cantopop icon and celebrated the metaverse in her designs. Four decades after she arrived on the New York fashion scene, Hong Kong native Vivienne Tam is still going strong. Faye Bradley profiles the woman behind the globally renowned label.

Fashion trailblazer Vivienne Tam was back on the Hong Kong stage last weekend, though it wasn't one of your typical runways. She had teamed up with one of the "Four Heavenly Kings" of Hong Kong pop music, Leon Lai. The Central Harbourfront was converted into the city's largest outdoor catwalk for Lovfinity, a double bill featuring Lai's concert and a showcasing of Tam's Web3-inspired Spring/Summer 2023 (SS2023) collection from New York Fashion Week (NYFW) held in September.

"I think it's a first for both the fashion and music industries in Hong Kong," Tam told China Daily in the lead-up to the event. "Leon is one of my favorite singers from Hong Kong, I have fond memories of him visiting my show in New York many years ago and finally working on this concert together is just amazing."

The show opened with models strutting the catwalk in outfits emblazoned with some of the world's most famous, blue-chip NFT avatars, from Bored Ape Yacht Club and CryptoPunks to CyberKongz gorillas and Awkward Astronauts, against a backdrop of the glittering Hong Kong skyline. Colorful mahjong motifs also made an appearance in the playful collection. Louise Wong, who plays Anita Mui in the 2021 biopic, sang Lady Gaga's Born This Way.

"NFT, cryptocurrency, DAO - it's like jazz music: either you get it, or you don't," states Tam's eponymous label bluntly in its press release. "Is this fashion, tech or art?" the brand continues, clearly reveling in blurring the lines between the three. Tam has partnered with First Digital, a Hong Kong-based provider of digital asset custody services, as well as the cryptocurrency exchange Gemini, to develop her metaverse-themed collection.

"We need imagination and creativity; we need both the physical and the virtual to complete ourselves," says Tam. "We need better balance in the world, and I see the Vivienne Tam brand as being the bridge between the two worlds." With her fashion runway, the designer is bringing more color and feminine energy to Web3.

A determined path

Blending cultures is in Vivienne Tam's DNA. Ever since her debut in 1982, a blending of Chinese and Western elements has been her signature.

Tam - who grew up poor in a tiny flat in Shek Kip Mei - recalls how, from the age of eight, her mother would take her to Sham Shui Po and Mong Kok to buy fabric ends for making cheongsam and other outfits for the family. At the time, Tam says, local people didn't appreciate Chinese culture the way they do now. Western styles were the epitome of sophistication and luxury. Also Hong Kong was a mercantile place: a hard-scrabble manufacturing hub, not an incubator for young designers.

None of this deterred Tam, who was determined to bring Chinese culture and its traditional sartorial designs to the world. Following an inspiring trip to New York, the young designer returned to Hong Kong and made 20 outfits using locally made fabrics. She then packed them up to pitch the Big Apple's biggest department stores - initially, to no avail. Persisting through multiple setbacks, Tam got her first order - and window - from Carol Brown, a buyer at the Henri Bendel department store. It was a deal that would herald the start of the designer's illustrious career.

Since then Tam has made it her passion and mission to incorporate elements of Chinese culture into every one of her collections, from Chinese Imperial Palace architecture and the Dunhuang murals to chinoiserie decorations, and reinterpretations of cheongsam collars and Chinese knots. Her recent collections include kung fu jackets and cheongsam reconstructed in washed and jacquard denim. Chinese porcelain motifs turned into prints and embroidery on dresses also figure.

She finds inspiration in Hong Kong landscapes. In 2021 she went hiking in the SAR's country parks as well as urban areas, seeking out off-beat routes. Some of the ideas gathered during those treks went into her City Camouflaged collection. A campaign for the collection filmed on the Ngong Ping 360 cable car and around Po Lin Monastery was launched online amid the pandemic.

"Hong Kong is ever-changing," she notes. "Every time I come back there's something new: new buildings, new brands, new shops, new restaurants, new chefs, new happenings and innovations." She adds that the city's arts scene is getting more exciting, especially since the opening of M+ and Hong Kong Palace Museum, institutions which resonate with Tam's own East-meets-West ethos.

Being iconic

Tam has designed for a number of celebrities, from supermodel Naomi Campbell, and Hollywood stars Julia Roberts and Jessica Alba to pop star Lady Gaga and US First Lady Jill Biden. For her FW17 runway show in New York, the designer dressed former US first daughters Ivanka and Tiffany Trump.

The designer-turned-icon has written a book, China Chic (2006), and has pieces from her collections in the permanent archives of New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art, London's Victoria and Albert Museum, and Pittsburgh's Andy Warhol Museum. In 2007 she won both the Visionary Award at the Asian Excellence Awards and Veuve Clicquot's Business Woman of the Year Award. In 2017 she picked up the International Designer of the Year Award at the China Fashion Awards.

Asked about her proudest moment to date, however, Tam reminisces about her first runway show at New York Fashion Week in 1993. "I didn't want to use borrowed money so I worked very, very hard to save up for my first show," she says. "When I finally made it, it was a dream come true. Everyone loved the collection and it earned me my first Women's Wear Daily cover, as well as many buyer orders."

Nearly three decades later, Tam's designs continue to evolve in response to the changing times. This spirit of innovation is evident across her collections, not least the recent Web3-inspired show. "I'm very intrigued by the NFT community: we share the same principle of uniqueness and borderless possibilities."

The designer is committed to sustainability through reducing fabric waste - using leftover material to create patchworks and masks, for example.

"I try to use natural materials like cotton and linen as much as possible; also, innovative sustainable materials made from recycled bottles for bags and linings," Tam says.

She often visits rural villages in China, as part of her mission to help local artisans turn their wares into products. Some of her own designs are inspired by traditional artisanal craft. "I work with villagers to produce crochet, beading and craftwork so they can make a better living," Tam explains. "At the same time, (I help) revitalize their culture and craft by incorporating them in my designs."

When it comes to her clothing, bringing positivity to the wearer is paramount. "I seek to empower women through my designs," says Tam.

She mentions seven-time Paralympic gold medal fencer Alison Yu, who models for her label, as one embodying the Vivienne Tam ethos. "She is strong and beautiful, full of positive energy and courage that empower my designs, and at the same time my designs empower her as a woman. I love that exchange."