SECOND Skin

Rising Chinese designer Rui Zhou on gender fluidity and the relationship between fabric and skin.

- IAN LOH

Shanghai-based, Parsons graduate Rui Zhou rose to fame thanks to her ability of using a soft language to pronounce hard shapes. Zhou’s works compellingly explore fashion through a dynamic art form. Her unconventional silhouettes often form an intimacy between the skin and fabric, body and garment, entity and boundary—a relationship that is poetic, subtle and elegant.

Her ready-to-wear label, RUI, both amplifies and reveals the body through knit bodysuits, circular and oval cut-outs, and form-fitting separates. Her gentle yet impactful designs have also managed to strip away any gender connotations by treating the body shape as a frame. Since then, the label has drawn the attention of the industry, as well as celebrities and singers of the likes of Dua Lipa and Solange. Last year, Zhou was one of the nine finalists for the LVMH Prize and went on to win the Karl Lagerfeld Special Prize.

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