You can call Shangguan Zhe's fashions eccentric, but his Tibetan-inspired robes have attracted a chic following. Gan Tian catches up with the award-winning young designer.

Fashion designer Shangguan Zhe sits in the Centro Bar of Kerry Center Hotel in Beijing's CBD. The 29-year-old man seems not to fit in this serious environment - he looks like an ancient sorcerer in a room full of modern businessmen.

While everyone around us is wearing black suits and white shirts, he is wearing a giant black robe, decorated with small embroideries of colorful religious symbols. His pants are ankle-length, with straight, clean lines - these garments are his own creations.

Shangguan is the winner in the fashion section of the 2013 Wall Street Journal Innovator of the Year Awards in China, a prize he will collect later in the day.

It was these wizard robes that have brought him the award, says Lin Jian, China's famous fashion critic and a member of the awards judging panel.

"We haven't see this kind of creativity among China's fashion industry for years," Lin says.

Shangguan's intriguing styles were launched early last year in Shanghai, in the name of his own label Sankuanz. The 2013 autumn/winter collection includes oversized robes of many layers, decorated with various embroideries - symbolic elements from Tibetan Buddhism, such as monsters, wheels of life and lanterns.

He uses many accessories in this collection. A belt, composed of colorful strings, is attached to some handmade pendants in shape of a monster's head, which make the whole collection very cult and religious, but, in a chic way.

The collection, named "The Secret of Tibet", surprised the country's fashion critics. Those who like it say it was one of the best collections in the Chinese mainland from the past five years, some calling Shangguan "the ghost talent". Those who hate the look, meanwhile, say the garments are not wearable at all.

However, it certainly created a stir at Shanghai Fashion Week this year, which had long been rather boring.

"I was indeed inspired by Tibet, especially those monks' garments," Shangguan says, adding that he magnifies the look both in its size and patterns.

However, the young designer says his Sankuanz brand is very personal.

Majoring in graphic design at Xiamen University, he switched gears after graduation in 2007 and took up fashion design.

"I simply love to make garments," he says.

By using his savings of about 10,000 yuan ($1,650), he founded a label named Ze with some other like minds. According to him, this label was - and is - much more "commercial".

The first collection came out at the end of 2007, which contained about 20 looks. This brand, according to Shangguan, has targeted consumers between 20 and 30. It includes normal shirts, tees and pants for daily wear. The designer focused on using eco-friendly materials, which makes the clothes very comfortable. Each item was priced between 300 and 1,000 yuan.

Due to a lack of funds, Shangguan's partners decided the collection would only be sold on taobao.com, the top Chinese online customer-to-customer marketplace. This turned out to be very successful, and since then, the new designer decided to pursue this career path.

Shangguan says he has not met big obstacles along the way. Over the past six years, Ze has developed into a well-established independent designer label. Shangguan has also caught attention from the country's fashion elite.

In 2010, Vogue China launched The Vogue Talents Corner, which sells products from designers it rates as the most creative young talents in China. Shangguan was chosen for the new platform.

Shangguan says Ze is commercially successful now. Though not revealing specifics of Ze's sales, he says the brand has been growing in sales during the past six years, and it has met his expectations. In the future, he will focus more on the new higher-end brand Sankuanz.

"I will not do haute couture, and will put my effort on Sankuanz ready-to-wear. Now, I don't have financial burdens, so for me, the only difficulty is to find inspiration for my design," he says.

Sankuanz, after the buzz from Shanghai Fashion Week, is popular among the top fashionistas. Buyers from well-established shopping malls around the world have purchased garments from this collection. Now they are available in Joyce in Hong Kong and Rei Kawakubo in Japan.

Shangguan says he likes Kawakubo. "Her creations are simple, elegant, yet very imaginative," he says.

As the night falls, Shangguan leaves the hotel pub for the award ceremony. When he walks through the bar, many businessmen with serious faces stop chatting and look at him, or the weird robe he is wearing. Like it or not, Shuangguan is a magnet for attention.

Contact the writer at gantian@chinadaily.com.cn.

(China Daily 01/08/2014 page19)