Huishan Zhang’s Spring/Summer 2024 Ready-To-Wear Collection

In the little more than 10 years since the Qingdao-born, London-based designer Huishan Zhang started his label, attitudes toward luxury craftsmanship have fundamentally shifted. Zhang established an atelier in his native city on China’s Yellow Sea coast in the early days of his brand, and he can still recall his first trip to Paris to meet with buyers, who admitted they admired his pretty, feminine clothes, but pronounced that their clients wouldn’t be interested in them when they learned where they were made. China wasn’t synonymous with savoir faire for a certain type of luxury customer.

How times have changed. “You’re telling stories all the time, about where I am now, what I’ve experienced, and on the side I’m telling China’s story as well, about how we manufacture and how we put things together,” said Zhang, characteristically diplomatic and optimistic as he spoke backstage before his spring show. “Along the way, we have collected women who appreciate the thought we put into the garments. We’ve continuously had a cheongsam line [a permanent edit of dresses inspired by the traditional Chinese silhouette], which is a tribute to my own heritage; we use polished jade buttons. All these details go into this cultural project to actually emphasize what Made in China stands for.”

Today’s show was a chance for Zhang to experiment with lightness and fluidity while turning out the carefully crafted, delicate eveningwear and sugary daywear he’s known for. Energized by a screening of Luca Guadagnino’s Suspiria, as well as by the striking movement of German choreographer and dancer Pina Bausch, he had raw emotion on the brain. “This season is about the woman who can so freely express herself,” he said. This manifested in supersoft silk jersey dresses in shades of ballet pink and black, in paillette dresses made to swing as they walked, in silk slip dresses trimmed with lace that had been hand-painted in Italy and hand-embroidered with beads and jewels in India (lace is shaping up to be a “thing” for spring).

Building on the denim pieces he showed for fall, there was an emphasis, too, on daywear, a category that Zhang has been steadily expanding. White cotton shirts and pleated skirts trimmed with his signature sparkle opened the show, while louche suiting boasted added oomph thanks to trailing fringe at the jacket cuffs. (Zhang likes a trim, and many in the front row were wearing his tweed jackets frosted with pearls.) One of the best looks paired a heavily embroidered princess skirt with a tailored black jacket, perhaps a little nod to NYFW’s styling tic last week of matching studious tailored blazers with frivolous miniskirts.

Still, it was the evening dresses that delighted, particularly the two crocheted tulle tunics embellished with rhinestones and layered over long skirts that could have closed the show. Backstage, Zhang showed how the most sylphlike of pieces had been secured on a base of grosgrain ribbons or immaculately lined, with zippers covered with topstitching to ensure they sat perfectly flat. With other designers cutting corners, presumably in a bid to maintain margins, Zhang’s dedication to echoing the couture studio’s petites mains mantra that the inside of a garment should look as beautiful as the outside is admirable—and will ensure his clients keep coming back for more loveliness.