Clothing Styles

Clothing Styles

Clothing Styles in Asia
Three of the most popular national costumes in Asia are Japanese kimono, Chinese cheongsam and Indian Sari. Although these three countries belong to Asia, each of the costumes is very unique and differs from each other. By looking at the national costumes helps us to understand the history and culture of each countries that is hidden beneath it. First of all, kimono is the Japanese traditional costume. Kimono are T-shaped, straight-lined robes that comes down to the ankle, and has wide full-length sleeves. The earliest kimono was influenced by Chinese traditional costume hanfu, dating back to the fifth century. Changing its shape, kimono became stylized by the Japan’s Heian period. By the Muromachi period, kimono became much simple which is called kosode and during the Edo period, the sleeves became longer especially among unmarried women, and the obi became wider. Since then, the basic shape of both men’s and women’s kimono has kept its shape. Kimono ranges from extremely formal to casual by the pattern fabric and color. For example beautiful pattern of the traditional Japanese pictures are designed on the formal furisode and also, kamon which is the Japanese heraldry is often designed on the formal mofuku. yukata is a casual kimono which is worn in summer uses porous cloth. Nowadays, kimono is mostly worn by woman on Formal occasion, sometimes on a daily basis. Furisode are worn by girls that come of age, and Sumo wrestlers wear yukata as their everyday clothes. People wear yukata in summer at the mature, which is the Japanese traditional festival. At the Japanese traditional tea ceremonies, it is proper to wear kimono. Secondly, moving our attention to Chinese traditional costume cheongsam, that is also known as the China dress. Cheongsam is a one-piece dress for woman which has slits on the side which comes up to the thigh. The history of cheongsam starts when the ancient Manchu women wore a one-piece dress called qipao. By law,...

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