I received my BFA in China, then I attended an MFA program at Fashion Institute of Technology in 2018, in New York. I self-learned 3D printing, including 3D modeling design and production. I have several years of experience in the fashion industry.

Being a fashion designer is a way that I interact with my inner being and society. Fashion reflects the environment I live in and the way I see the world, connecting to issues concerning gender, race, culture, religion, technology… For me, my designs express my view/value in various ways. I want to share my thoughts through my projects.

ZHUO is a brand for clothing and sustainable fashion accessories. It is challenging the traditional definition of fashion materials/fabrics. ZHUO is a Chinese word with multiple layered meanings: polish, refine and think. The name signifies the opposite of fast fashion.

I am currently living in US and making new projects for womenswear and sustainable fashion accessory.

Design shows my value toward the current society and my vision for the future. What makes it essential is that it connects with human beings in multiple aspects. Every aspect of a design connects to people’s senses of aesthetics and purpose for a particular piece. It reflects a desire for beauty, usefulness, and leads you to think about the creator’s intention imbued in the object.

Designs that include innovative fabric, especially those that are environmentally friendly/sustainable.

Sustainable fashion is more than just addressing fashion textiles or products. It’s about every step involved in the entire industrial chain. It has so many problems and needs more actions. There is a stereotype that “ethical” fashion products equal “boring”. As a designer, there so much room and responsibility for me to bring excitement, energy to my design projects, no matter clothing or fashion accessories.

A "good" design must provide both a useful function and inspires the user/appreciator with a vision for the future.

Avant-garde, innovative material and environmentally friendly/sustainable design.

I am always fascinated by experimenting with different types of unconventional material, even if they are not originally for the fashion industry. I love involving these materials in my collection and giving a surreal visual effect in my pieces.

Sustainable design is something I always pursue. It involves many processes, and it needs both creativity and industry knowledge to design, operate and implement. It’s still quite challenging.

I don’t have specific a formula for my process. But it usually starts with experimental research. Sometimes I start with a fabric experiment. Sometimes I start with color collages. Sometimes I start with researching a very specific social topic. I also like writing down my thoughts or key words in my notes to help me brainstorm.

Then I will be able to gather all different elements and evaluate through my own perspective, which is the most important part and it is also why I do all the research at the beginning -- you may question yourself “why do I use vermilion but not crimson red?”

Definitely. And I think that can apply to anyone. The way my thoughts process is sure affected by the environment I grew up in and how I was educated.

I am very honored to be the winner of 2021 MUSE Design Awards. I feel great that I can deliver my thoughts and idea through my work on this amazing platform. It wasn’t very easy to get here and I appreciate the recognition of the efforts to complete the whole collection.

My project Free Follow has many interesting elements that I wanted to show.

In the collection Free Follow, I intentionally weakened the sense of the traditional clothing flatness, aiming to highlight the three-dimensional sense of modeling different parts of the piece. After many attempts and selections, the light texture and strong holding power of the translucent matte paper enabled me to actualize this 3-D modeling of the parts. The lightness and transparency alleviated the heaviness of the image (printed on the medical film), and catered to the emotional atmosphere of the entire series.

I chose medical film -- unconventional material which is rarely used in the garment industry. I caught my own images, trying to blur and overlap every single image to create the unique vision of the self-phantom.

The 3D modeling part was pretty difficult. First, the final 3D shapes came out from a decent amount of experiments. And it was not easy to find the right material that’s light weight and at the same time is able to hold the 3D shape.

Award recognition is proof that my work inspired people. It gives me more confidence and encouragement on this path.

Color, fabric and the connection with humanity.

Nowadays more and more young people start embracing fashion revolution, which requires a long, iterative process of experimentation. In China, it is relatively more convenient and affordable to access to certain resources, thus allowing you to cut down the cost and do more experiments in the design phase. If it wasn’t that case then it wouldn’t be that easy for me to find the right material for my Free Follow collection. Printing on the medical film would be quite expensive in the US and most printing shops here would not provide the service for this material.

More and more designers will focus on sustainable design. People’s attitude toward fashion consumption, and hopefully consumption in general, will gradually change. We will have to look back to the path we have went through and realize how the things we have done have affected our home.

Design does not only need passion, it also needs a great amount of responsibility and understanding of connections and dependencies with the wider society.

Experiment.

Design is all about taking risks and putting your own spin on things. Developing your own style comes from experimenting and willing to be different. Design is based on your own practice and creative exploration, so those resources that you would need would be dependent on your design interests. For example, if you are interested in sustainable design, you might contact local fabric recycling services for their materials.

I was dreaming to be a science-fiction author at some point when I was young.

Gabrielle Bonheur Chanel. She is an extraordinary fashion designer and successful businesswoman. It was not easy to be a female designer in the era she was living.

Be honest with yourself.