Bing Xiong’s graduate collection does not only celebrate her own experience and journey but stands for a collective trauma that a lot of people are going through. “I grew from a size small to a size extra-large. It was a special experience because when I was very slim, everything seemed to look so good on me. But when I gained weight, I was told that everything looked ugly on me. I stopped wearing sleeveless clothing, I started to wear black all the time since it made me look slim. Black made me look indifferent,” she says. In that period of time, the designer lost her confidence in herself and her body. “In China, we are very strict with women’s bodies. Fat is not seen as aesthetic.” Eventually, a few months later, her flatmate took an image of her lying on the sofa. “He showed me the picture. For the first time, I saw my body in a beautiful light. It looked so cinematic. I liked the extra layers of flesh around the waist. The curves looked beautiful and sexy.” This image made her transition from hiding to showing. The designer wanted to celebrate her body in a way she never did before. Her clothing is the synchronisation of flesh and fabrics, highlighting the most beautiful parts. “I tried to find the moment in my life where I could expose my body. The moment I wanted to capture is the act of taking one’s clothes off. The process of undressing is a moment where you expose every part of your body. Every flaw, every imperfection is visible. I wanted to show this in my design.”