From The Straits Times    |
In the Mood for Cheongsams

What does the cheongsam mean to you? For me, and probably for many other women, the traditional Chinese dress symbolised restrictiveness, tradition and a garment from a bygone era that I thought I would never wear.

But I still ended up having a tailor make a modern interpretation of the cheongsam with a flared skirt, in grey and blue checked gingham fabric two years ago.

The two things seminal in changing my mind about the cheongsam were, of course, the movie In The Mood For Love – seeing Maggie Cheung in one impeccably tailored cheongsam after another will change how you view the dress – and Tan Sheau Yun’s quirky takes on the garment for her store Tong Tong Friendship Store. The cheongsam has since taken on an indescribable allure for me – mixing mystery, sensuality, cuteness, history and an entire ethnic community’s culture in one pretty package.

In the Mood for Cheongsams

See over 150 cheongsam from the 1920s to the present day at this exhibition.
Images: National Museum of Singapore

Fittingly, both the movie and Ms Tan’s work are reflected in the National Museum’s new exhibition In The Mood for Cheongsam: Modernity and Singapore Women which is now open to the public.

In fact, one of Ms Tan’s dresses in a red gingham check fabric with large fabric-covered buttons along the side is featured in a section with designs by John Galliano, Alexander McQueen, Vivienne Tam and others who have also reinterpreted the cheongsam.

(Unfortunately, the pieces from In The Mood For Love aren’t on display. As the curator Chung May Khuen told me, they were so tight-fitting that a small movement would result in tears and had to be repaired on-site. They were in such bad shape by the end of filming that even the Hong Kong Film Archives doesn’t have them.)

As we were taken through the gallery by Ms Chung, we saw the evolution of the cheongsam from a looser-fitting garment only worn by the educated elite women in China in the 1920s to one which became more body-conscious in the 1950s, a time when women were mobilised into the workforce and took up occupations which were not previously available to them.

The 1950s was also the period which Ms Chung termed the “golden period” of the cheongsam in Singapore. With the variety of fabrics made available because the country had become the regional textile centre by then, this section is the most colourful with batik, op art and geometric prints, sequins, beading, lace and more.

“It didn’t matter how many you owned or how many you could afford, the fact that it could be worn to work, an evening function or to dinner meant that the cheongsam was popular among women back then. There was place for it in any occasion,” says Ms Chung.

One of the highlights of the exhibition for me is in this section – a black and white photograph showing scientists-to-be from Raffles College. Amongst a group of around 20 men, five women stood front and centre, with one clad in a sari, and three others clad in cheongsams – a statement of femininity and feminism.

And as you walk to the next part which showcases the wardrobes of some very famous women in Singapore history – among them, war heroine Elizabeth Choy and the pieces she wore to the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II in 1953; Christina Loke, who was voted one of the world’s ten most beautiful women in 1965 by American Vogue and Datin Aw Cheng Hu, part of the Tiger Balm family who always wore hers with matching lipstick and jewellery – you’ll find the term “exhibition” a little too staid for this experience.

Life has been breathed into the pieces simply because they’ve been worn and treasured. It allows you to see history from a perspective different from viewing a painting, statue or photograph, something which really hits home when you see the subdued cream-coloured cheongsam worn by the late Mrs Lee Kuan Yew to her son’s swearing-in ceremony as Prime Minister in 2004.

Add on the fact that all the 150 cheongsams on display are handsewn by tailors who trained at their crafts for decades, starting with a five-year apprenticeship from as young as 12 years old, and you’ll gain a whole new level of appreciation for the garment.

Even with the advent of sewing machines, cheongsams back then were always custom-made, required a few fittings and never machine-sewn, save for some zippers.

This is why they could cost between $80 to $300, depending on how much detail was required — quite a large sum in the 1950s.

To pay tribute to these silent hands, a Tailor’s Room awaits you at the end. This room held a lot of meaning for me, especially because I’ve hit a roadblock in learning to sew.

Surrounded by mock fabric bolts, old photos of graduating classes from tailoring schools and seeing a sewing pattern ingeniously cut from newspaper (rather than the usual tracing paper) donated by a retired seamstress who learned how to sew from her mother, I was given motivation to continue in my quest.

This whole experience also inspired me to dig out the ankle-length pink cheongsam my mother, who is Indian, wore when she married into a Chinese family in the 1980s. It’s still in perfect condition, the sequinned neckline intact and shiny as ever, a testament to craftsmanship that you can’t find in today’s fast fashion.

Maybe like me, you’ll discover (or re-discover) a piece of your own history as well when visiting this exhibition.

In The Mood for Cheongsam: Modernity and Singapore Women is on at the National Museum’s Exhibition Gallery 1 from now to June 27, 2012, 10am to 6pm daily. Free admission. Free guided tours are available from Apr 3 in English at 2.30pm on Tues, Thurs & Fri and 11am and 2.30pm on weekends, and in Mandarin at 11.30am and 2.30pm on weekends. Curator’s Tours are on April 18 and May 23 at 7.30pm. Tickets at $15 are available from SISTIC. Log on to http://www.nationalmuseum.sg/ExhibitionDetail.aspx?id=67&cat=2 for more.


Vanessa is a freelance writer and can be found at thesewingwriter.tumblr.com.

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