The Red Gang

Ningbo international fashion fair

I was kindly invited to attend the Ningbo international fashion fair by a Henry Bailey Bespoke Tailors. Henry Bailey were to be exhibiting at the event and were looking to promote British bespoke tailoring in China, a cause close to my heart. We had a beautiful stand with fine examples of hand made bespoke garments and a team of specialists conducting demonstrations and available to answer questions. We had a diverse team who's locations spanned the globe but were all trained in the traditional Savile Row style. It made for an amazing week and some interesting collaborations for future projects on which I will keep you posted! More information and pictures on my week at the exhibition next time. Firstly I want to explain why Ningbo as a fashion centre of China.

Ningbo 寧波 calm wave. The city of Ningbo is an industrial Mecca of garment production  and manufacturing. Full of sky scrapers and concrete much of what is seen is like any other financial or industrial area world wide. But Ningbo has an interesting history regarding garments, specifically tailoring.

Being a port city the area was key to growth of the economic climate in the 1920's. Many expats moved to China in this time moving to the areas of growth and development which ningbo was fast becoming. The westerners that moved into town had requirements for living and had to source items from home and abroad. Tailoring was now desired in these areas and the voyage back to England too extreme for a new suit. English masters of tailoring visited china and recruited young men and boys to learn their craft to clothe the affluent new population. The young men proved to be good 

apprentices and had quick nimble figures and were thankful not to be suffering the hardships of a 

career in farming. 

The Ningbo trainees learned quickly and are now considered world class tailors and continue to pass on the skills learnt through the generations. Being a tailor was considered of a low social status in China but the skills were respected by their piers. Many tailors have since moved into Shanghai and are producing high quality work at a fraction of the Savile Row price tag. Tailoring schools and cutting books have been created recordings the teaching of the traditional ways. The Garment museum in Ningbo documents the rise of tailoring and the modern effects on the city to date. 

These skilled tailors were named the Hong Bang 鴻邦 which translates to the red gang or red guild. This is rumoured to be in homage to the masters that taught the tailors and the customers of the time of their founding. Apparently many of the western men the Chinese came in contact with had wild red hair and big blue eyes. The name still suggests quality worldwide, even if the red hair is fading out in the west.

China is proud of these craftsman and earlier this year a musical was performed, Hong Bang Tailors
musical focused on the rivalries between Shanghai tailors and ningbo trained tailors. Ningbo tailors are quoted as making the first western suit and Sun yet-sen jacket made famous by Chairman Mao. As a celebration of this garment in 2011 an anniversary edition of this jacket was produced on a large scale by traditional Ningbo tailors.

After Sun Yat-sen's death in 1925, popular mythology decreed that the garment had many meanings as well as functions. The four pockets were said to represent the Four Virtues cited in the classic Guanzi: Propriety, Justice, Honesty, and Shame.The five center-front buttons were said to represent 

the five Yuans (branches of government)–legislation, supervision, examination, administration and jurisdiction–cited in the constitution of the Republic of China and the three cuff-buttons to symbolise Sun Yat-sen's Three Principles of the People: Nationalism, Democracy, and People's Livelihood. Finally, unlike Western-style suits that are usually composed of two layers of cloth, the jacket is in a single piece–symbolizing China's unity and peace. The garment is still popular today worn as wedding suits and by celebrities. 

The Hong Bang tailors future may be endangered as there is a severe drought in youth coming into the trade. Young Chinese people especially young men are not interested in learning a craft. An apprenticeship is 3-4 years similar to The Savile Row cousins and the youth of China are more demanding of immediate results. There are less then 100 descendants of the Hong Band tailors left in Ningbo and with the mass growth of machine cut and produced garments being made in the region the future of the Red gang may be shadowed by the looming development of commercial China.