Former Miss China Du Juan has proved her appeal in her native Shanghai. But how well does her charm translate to the catwalks of New York? Not too badly, apparently.
Since appearing with Australian model Gemma Ward on the cover of Vogue China’s premiere issue last September, Du has been in constant motion. She has graced Paris and Italian Vogue, too. In Paris and Milan earlier this year, Du sizzled on the catwalk at Marc Jacob’s Louis Vuitton show, as well as for Hermes, Yves Saint Laurent, Bottega Veneta and a few others. That led the editors at Style.com Vogue and W Magazine’s website to name her as one of autumn’s top 10 new faces.
But Du Juan is more than just the next big Asian model. According to the China Daily, her success, in many ways, reflects the changing attitude towards Asian beauty in a globalizing world. Buoyed by interest in Asia and movie stars with a growing international presence, China’s potential as a land of buyers of luxury goods has made Chinese beauty matter.
The daughters of the East, therefore, have an even more prominent role to play in the fashion industry, in which a convergence of taste has been emerging. All this makes Du Juan hot property.
More proof of the 178-centimetre model’s rising status was her appearance in Models.com’s top-50 female models’ list (at this moment on rank 27).
Interest in the Asian region has grown. China’s rise, Japanese economic resurgence and the spreading popularity of Korean pop culture have had attractions: More people want to read about, write about and watch Asia. In the United States, the number of Asian women in the news, commercials and TV shows has risen, even if only slightly.
Then there’s the rise of Asian actresses. Lucy Liu is the most famous Asian-American actress today, with several blockbusters on her resume.
Riding on more mainstream movies such as “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” and “Memoirs of a Geisha,” and the proliferation of Asian film festivals across the world, China-born actresses such as Zhang Ziyi, Gong Li and Maggie Cheung have been propelled into international magazines and endorsements.
Zhang Ziyi and Gong Li both have appeared in People magazine’s 100 most beautiful people list, with Zhang making her third appearance this year.
The rise of these Chinese actresses has helped fuel a surge of Western interest in Asia, Hong Kong-born New York-based designer Vivienne Tam told the China Daily.
Source:
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/
Selected links:
http://iamfashion.blogspot.com/
http://www.style.com/
http://www.perlesdetahiti.net/
http://models.com/
Just got an email with some backstage photos of Du Jean:
Source:
http://websitemaker.kennisnet.nl/Evalicious/
The Marco posting flood continues! 😉
On a more serious note, why is it that fashion models are almost never very pretty? Is it that they don’t want the model to distract attention from the clothes?
Whoah, we’ve got an Aussie girl (Gemma Ward) at number 2 on the top models list! I do think she is one of the better looking fashion models around at the moment actually (even though she isn’t Asian).
She’s Beautiful. My girlfriends looks a little like her. But, she’s from Shandong.
eye of the beholder! simply put: the criteria for fashion models isn’t the same as for glamour models or playboy-type models. some of them are very beautiful, but most of them are just average-looking. they are chosen more for how the clothes will hang on them most of the time. other times, they have a “special something” that a designer or agency thinks will make them, and therefore the clothes they wear, stand out and sell better. uma thurman (former runway model) is a classic example. also, for an asian example, jenny shimizu (whom i think is a knockout), or koyuki, the japanese runway-model-turned-actress (whom i think is plainer than a coat of white paint) who was tom cruise’s love interest in “last samurai”.
Great post! I remember seeing a book many moons ago that I think was entitled Scavullo Women. It showed before and after dhots of his models….One of the most fascinating make-up/photo technique books I’ve ever seen….
And I remember one of his models (sadly taken by aids early in the epidemic) was Gia Caragni: http://giacarangi.topcities.com/nudes.html
A master of make-up and photography…
That would be SHOTS not dhots…sheesh…
“the number of Asian women in the news, commercials and TV shows has risen, even if only slightly”
I’ve noticed that as well. Nearly every other t.v. commercial here in the states now features an Asian-America woman.
Ai Tominaga maybe you want to put her on the site. She is a SUPERmodel. Chang Chun Xiao another supermodel here are some imgs since she is harder to search for
Model_ChangChunXiao_3.jpg
Model_ChangChunXiao1.jpg
Model_ChangChunXiao_4.jpg