Vintage shop owner brings bit of Hong Kong to Beijing

By Bi Mengying Source:Global Times Published: 2019/8/20 17:08:40

Lau Hui-fai in his Delia vintage shop in Beijing Photo: Bi Mengying/GT



Items on display at Delia vintage shop in Beijing Photo: Bi Mengying/GT



 

Items on display at Delia vintage shop in Beijing Photo: Bi Mengying/GT



 

Items on display at Delia vintage shop in Beijing Photo: Bi Mengying/GT

Items on display at the Delia vintage shop Photo: Bi Mengying/GT

Lau Hui-fai outside his Delia vintage shop in Beijing Photo: Bi Mengying/GT



Close to the Lama Temple, the Wudaoying hutong (a narrow alley) in Beiijng is packed with independent cafes, trendy bars and boutiques selling handmade jewelry; and then there is Delia, a vintage clothing shop opened by Lau Hui-fai, a Hongkonger, about a decade ago. 

Walking into the shop, it seemed more like a museum that a store. In addition to clothing and accessories, there were also books, vinyl records, posters and many other interesting objects that I couldn't identify lying around. Behind each of these items lies a great story.   

Vintage museum

Many of the huge colorful posters hanging down from the ceiling were educational materials, such as a periodic table that looked like it was made for a high school chemistry class back in the 1970s. There were also many hand drawn slides for old-style projectors that were used for English class. I randomly picked up one and looking closely saw a picture of several students talking in front of the gate to a school. Below the picture was written "I am going to school." 

While Lau collected some of the items at flea markets in Beijing, many of which do not exist any longer, some of items were brought from Hong Kong such as a Gucci dress from the 1990s and designer clothes by Vivienne Tam, who was born in Guangdong Province and moved to Hong Kong. 

"I think she was the first Chinese designer who introduced Chinese elements to the world stage of fashion," said Lau.

Pointing to a backpack on the shelf, an Italian brand no longer in production, he noted that back when he was in high school, the brand was worn by the cool, rich kids. Most students like him could not afford something like it until they started working. 

"That's why it has sentimental value for me. But I'm guessing many people today who buy this brand of bag do not know the entire story," he added.  

Looking elsewhere

Lau is such a delightful character. The first time I met him, he put two stools outside his store so we could sit and talk. He kept smoking and laughing the whole time. His candid laughs was contagious, and I felt like I was talking with an old friend.

Lau was born in Hong Kong in 1978. His parents had moved to Hong Kong from Guangdong Province in South China. They'd frequently take him back there to visit family while he was a child. 

"I grew up during a time that was open to everything. For instance, my elementary school was a Christian school. My middle school was a Catholic school. I grew up with a diversity of cultures," he said. 

An open-minded explorer, Lau decided to move to Beijing in 2003. 

"There was SARS [Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome] at the time. The economy was not promising in Hong Kong. The entire society of Hong Kong was in a bad mood. And just like other ordinary young people, I wanted to get out of the place where I had lived for more than 20 years and see other places. Because of people like Dou Wei [a musician from Beijing], I always thought that Beijing must be a cool place," he said. 

A few years after moving to Beijing, Lau took over a coffee shop at the Wudaoying hutong. 

"I had been working in design and had many items such as clothing, books and paintings that I had collected from flea markets or brought here on my own. I wondered whether I could open a store to display them. Even though vintage stores were already popular in other countries, there were few in Beijing back then. I was trying to experiment… and I think much of the designs and literature from before the Internet is really intriguing," he said. 

'Opened my mind' 

When Lau first got to Beijing, he rented a room in a siheyuan (a traditional Chinese courtyard residence) right next to the Forbidden City. Winter in the capital was severely cold for a Hongkonger like himself, especially since his stove and heater at the time were coal fired. Lau was greatly relieved when natural gas pipelines were installed five years after he moved in.  

Communication also wasn't easy for him at first, since he only spoke Cantonese. There were few young people from Hong Kong at the time. As the years passed, however, this gradually changed as more and more Hongkongers came to Beijing for business or study. 

"To some extent, Beijing has a more diverse culture than Hong Kong, particularly after the Olympic Games… So many people from different nations as well as people from different ethnic groups… Beijing has been open to outsiders. I came and I stayed. Different people come here to be Beijingers. Living here exposes me to different cultures. It opened my mind," he said.
Newspaper headline: Introducing the past


Posted in: ART,CULTURE & LEISURE,ARTS FOCUS

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