Will the Real Tsumori Chisato Please Stand Up?

The funny thing about shopping in Shanghai is the exposure to designer labels I was otherwise unfamiliar with. Tsumori Chisato is the perfect example of a designer I'd read about, but hadn't seen a collection of. Suddenly I was seeing her name in all the boutiques and it's quirky and it's cute and it's bohemania...bits and pieces from her real collection all mashed up and distorted. A strange education being taught through kaleidoscope images. The take-home assignment was trying to work the equation backwards and figure out what the looking glass was pointed at.

Well, last week I finally got my first taste of the real Tsumori and her clothes were much more beautiful and more special than I had imagined. I wanted to take a proper picture to share with everyone, but the shop girl didn't like that idea. Below, the only picture I was able to take before she ixnayed the camera action...the colors, the colors!

> February 2007. Xintiandi, Shanghai.

And this is what I had been seeing in the boutiques:

> February 2007. Xinle Road, Shanghai.


Quite a difference. But let's face it, the Chinese didn't invent knock offs. In Western countries, designers are used for "inspiration". In China, they're used for marketing.