Ziqi Xing was born and grew up in Shenzhen China, later studied Fashion Design at Parsons The New School in New York City as well as studied knitwear design at Central Saint Martins in London. During her stay in New York City, she has worked for fashion brands including The Row and Prabal Gurung. In 2019, her design for the “Young Talents for Sustainable Thinking” exhibition was selected to be exhibited at Museo Salvatore Ferragamo in Florence, Italy from 26 April 2019 to March 2020. Ziqi is a collaborator in the “Transmissions: Heritage and New Creation” project held by Cristóbal Balenciaga Museum at Parsons. She is also the winner of the 14th International Design Awards in the apparel category. Ziqi’s artistic inspiration stems from her unique perspective of contemporary social phenomenon including the dominance of social media and fashion design copyright infringement.

I have a strong demand to express my identity. I think being a designer is the most attractive way for me to express myself.

My fashion design brand, Ziqi Xing, focuses on designing unique pieces which are inspired by contemporary social phenomenon to raise people’s awareness.

Design means “EVERYTHING” to me, it is the best way for me to express myself to the world.

My favorite kind of design is something inspiring and can influence the society in a creative way.

A good design is something consistent which translates the designer’s identity or idea.

In my collection “Copyright”, I explored the definition of US copyright law in fashion design and indicated the vagueness of design copyright law by creating an artistic form of statement through customized print design. Brands in the industry profit by repeating original content, especially using other brands’ online clothing images as inspiration. The rules of copying other’s design ideas are vague because there is no prevention of copying fashion designs in the US copyright laws while only certain patterns or prints could be protected. In order to mimic the “knockoff” phenomenon happening in the fashion industry, the goal of her collection is to delude viewers by combining the actual construction details of physical garments with digital print construction details.

In each look, I combine half 3D physical details with half 2D printed pixelated garment details, deliberately mimicking the actions of copying processes prevalent in the fashion industry.

Yes definitely, the copyright protection is quite weak while the impact of fashion is very strong in China. Thus, I want to express the importance of copyright protection in the fashion industry throughout my design.

It is such a great honour to be the winner of the 2021 MUSE Design Awards with more attention and credits from the industry and the wider audience.

My collection “Copyright” expresses the idea I want to yell out to the industry to focus on protecting designers’ copyright which is important to the industry today.

The biggest challenge was how I translate the conceptual idea of protecting copyright seamlessly to my design.

Winning the 2021 MUSE Design Awards is a vital step in my career to raise more attention to what I was working on and what I am going to be working on in the future.

1.Creativity

2.Potentiality

3. Influence

The rich heritage of China always inspired me to dig deeper in the professional field I want to explore which is the fashion industry.

Digital fashion has hit the industry due the covid-19. Inserting the digital aspects in fashion is going to be the future of the industry not only in the next 5-10 years but also in the long term aspect.

Please trust what you believe in and do your best to express yourself throughout your design. Also, make sure your design is consistent and means something.

I would say getting a fashion related degree is a good way to broaden your insight and connections. However, youtube is also a place to learn design skills and techniques.

I should say that the public, their little bits of life, needs and dreams, are the origin of our design, I want to give everyone that is warm and unique living space.

Everyone wanted to hear more about my collection when they saw the unique pixelated prints on my design.

I would say everyone and everything around me. I am an observer. I learn from observing people’s reaction and actions happening in the world around me which is where my inspiration comes from.

Believe in what you believe, and work hard on it!