A Study on the Application of Elements of Ethnic Dress in Modern Fashion Design/ Etudes Sur L'application des Elements de Costumes Ethniques Dans la Mode (Report‪)‬

With the advance of the digital age and the fast speed of communication, human is moving towards a brand new time in which the gap between cultural differences is narrowing down. People's values are more in line with each other and fashion, like a cold, quickly spreads throughout the whole world. However, there is also the opposite power in this trend. That is to say, it is due to the integration that people can recognize the cultural differences more clearly, and at the same time respect and cherish the differences. This is the consensus of mankind in a new era, and also a new starting point for re-studying the local culture. From a global perspective, the performance on ethnic style of clothing has always been prevalent since 1970s. People have explored new design methods and put them into practice. They create new design style, enlightened from the historical, ethnic and natural inspiration. This has fully demonstrated people's desire to return to nature, the spirit of getting back to basics and the necessary respect for history and attention to the awakening of consciousness of cultural heritage. Especially since the 1990's, with the increasing awareness of environmental and cultural ecological protection, the subject on ethnic style has been repeatedly performed by many designers, such as the Oriental Subject (China, India, Japan, Arab, etc.); the European subject (traditional folk costumes of the Nordic and the Eastern European); South America topic (Indiana, Mexico, etc.); Africa subject and so on. Ethnic style of dress is also beginning to be widely accepted, and occupy the market. It is well known that the development of China is not synchronized as that of the world before 1980s because of the historical reasons. Since the 1980's, as people started to pursue "the Westernization", suit became fashionable for a long time. People felt excited and also puzzled in such a dazzling costume world, and had to follow. Everything of ethnic has become recognized as conservative and outdated. So until the 1990's, people began to reflect deeply and study the real reason for the success of fashion as well as the failure. During this period, there is also discussion about nationalization, but most are staying at the theoretical stage. It lasts only few years that national style became truly fashionable and widely accepted by numbers of consumers. Especially in the years of 1999 and 2000, ethnic style became the mainstream of fashion. Clear imprint of ethnic style, such as embroidery designs, delicate lace, and bright color is marked on almost any type of clothing, such as fashion, casual wear, denim clothing and many with accessories, such as bags, shoes, scarves and hats, etc. Especially in the summer of 2000, the prevalence of Little Dragon put the national fashion to a climax.