Audi

Audi is 21 years old and in his final semester of his honors for Mathematics and Finance. He is Australian born and raised but his heritage is Chinese. He says he likes to consider himself very well dressed but he doesn’t consciously follow trends or have a distinct style. From viewing the fashion stimulus, he says that it is evident that there is heavy Asian inspirations, specifically from China and Japan and this is visible based on the style and title of ‘Kimono’, the Japanese flag and the Chinese pattern. We asked him how he knew where each of these features were from and he pinpointed it to his school education as well as his background. He recognised the Chinese pattern from a clothing item his mum has. He considers the jackets as “cool” because they look edgy and have striking cuts and thinks the prints are done tastefully. He believes that the use of these patterns and prints are more so for aesthetic appeal rather than to appreciate the culture and designers are capitalising on using them to create trends. He doesn’t view his cultural background as a factor in the formation of his opinion but rather it his knowledge of how business works. Audi also states that these clothes are a result of cultural appropriation but he doesn’t view them as offensive because they are not making fun of the culture.

He does have a strong opinion though on the two-piece set in which he expresses that the print in conjunction with the style of the items do not pay homage to the traditional dress of the Chinese of the culture and in a way is “fetishising the oriental print”. He also alludes to the social construct of ‘yellow fever’, something he says he has experienced first hand and how wearing this type of clothing only sexualises it further and says that the outfit is “not offensive but attracts attention in the era of social justice and political correctness.”