Xiaoya Zhang
Fashion Design BA Hons
Regent's University London
Specialisms: Womenswear
Location: Shanghai, China
Xiaoya Zhang
First Name: Xiaoya
Last Name: Zhang
Specialisms: Womenswear
Sectors:
My Location: Shanghai, China
University / College: Regent's University London
Course / Program Title: Fashion Design BA Hons
About
my name is Xiaoya Zhang, and I am currently studying BA Fashion Design at Regent’s University London. My design direction focuses on womenswear, deconstruction, material experimentation, female body expression, and emotional expression.
What interests me most about fashion is not only how clothing shapes or decorates the body, but how it can express emotion, identity, and the relationship between the female body and society. In my work, I often start from personal emotions, female experiences, and bodily feelings, then translate them into garment language through asymmetrical structures, wrapping, layering, draping, and fabric experimentation.
In the future, I would like to continue researching the relationship between softness and strength in womenswear. I want to use structure and materials to express the complexity of women, including vulnerability, protection, pressure, power, and self-expression. Career-wise, after graduation I hope to work as a Design Assistant in a womenswear brand, gain real experience in collection development, and gradually grow into a womenswear designer. In the long term, I hope to develop my own independent womenswear brand.
This project starts from a personal and emotional perspective to explore the concept of "deconstruction". During a period of anxiety and internal conflict, I began to reflect on my own state and transformed these emotions into design expressions. By deconstructing my own face and disassembling a backpack that has accompanied me for many years, I use these familiar objects as carriers to express discomfort, pressure and a sense of fragmentation. Through cutting, twisting and reassembling, the clothing presents a state of being pulled and out of balance.
This project centers around my mother, using her youthful photos and the pictures of my childhood taken with her to reflect her introverted personality and her protective nature towards me.