The well-known Louis Vuitton print, or references to it, can be seen just about everywhere: of course on fake LV handbags. But also on socks, scarves, stickers to decorate your mobile phone with, underwear, fabric, plastic carrier bags, hairpins and so on and so on.

A couple of days ago in the Guangzhou metro, I saw this woman wearing her LV inspired sleeves. These loose sleeves are worn mostly by women, and small children, over their coat sleeves. I guess they’re meant to keep the coat clean and whole. People wearing them are often engaged in activities involving dirt and grease (like streetvendors), and small children are of course crawling and climbing all over the place, including rather filthy floors.
So anyway, this woman is wearing loose sleeves that I associate with low income labour, yet sporting a motif that refers to one of the most ridiculously chic brands in the world. (Even though it’s not an exact copy: it says LS, not LV and the shapes that make up the pattern are not very precise replicas of the original LV shapes.)
Encounters as these fuel my curiousity about the cultural meaning of the act to copy from the Chinese perspective. I hope to address this later on in this blog.

My reflection in an LV shopwindow in Xiamen/November 2009

A Cinderella-esque skyline
In Guangzhou city centre, along the banks of the Pearl River, after dusk, light displays bring buildings and bridges to life. During the day, the contours of the hotels, apartment buildings and offices that line the river are smudged into forgettable oblivion by the greyish humid, smog-filled air.

And then, as soon as darkness has fallen, they’re dolled up with colourful neon or LED-lights and screens. Vying for attention like assertive wallflowers at a school ball, mindless yet mesmerizing animations, shapes, colour-shifts, often spanning the whole facade, turn them into the belles of the ball. Only to be turned back into black shadows again as the clock strikes 10 pm.