Investigation on the Craftsmanship Transmission and Dress Form of Hong Kong Men’s Cheongsam

"Hong Kong Cheongsam Making Technique" is one of Hong Kong's significant intangible cultural heritages, falling under the category of traditional handicrafts. It encompasses various dress forms of both men’s and women’s attire. This intangible cultural heritage has been successively listed in the first Intangible Cultural Heritage Inventory of Hong Kong1 in 2014, the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Hong Kong2 in 2017, and the National Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of China3 in 2021, demonstrating its representative cultural value and the urgent need for its preservation2.

Over the past decade, the government of Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and the local higher education sector have taken multiple measures to actively protect “Hong Kong Cheongsam Making Technique”. These measures include identification and documentation, collection and preservation of related materials and artifacts, historical and cultural research, initiation of pilot inheritance programs, and promotion through public exhibitions and lectures, achieving considerable research outcomes and societal attention. However, the protection efforts have been skewed, with the majority of measures focusing on the development and craftsmanship of the post-1950s women's cheongsam. The development and craftsmanship of men's cheongsam, traditional women's cheongsam in “small cut” (known as “discreet under-flap cheongsam”), and other related attires have been overlooked, gradually becoming the most endangered parts of this intangible cultural heritage.

Recognizing this, the School of Fashion and Textiles of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University has launched a series of research projects since 2021, focusing on the history, culture, craftsmanship, inheritance, and development direction of Hong Kong men's cheongsam. The aim is to supplement and enrich the overlooked aspects of men's cheongsam within “Hong Kong Cheongsam Making Technique”. Supported by the Intangible Cultural Heritage Funding Scheme of the Intangible Cultural Heritage Office of the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, the research team initiated a project in 2022 titled “The Craftsmanship of Hong Kong Men’s Cheongsam – Archive, Analysis, Inheritance, and Implementation”, dedicated to documenting and analyzing the craftsmanship of Hong Kong men's cheongsam.

The research team invited two registered bearers and senior cheongsam tailors from the Hong Kong Cheongsam Association (the designated protection organization for “Hong Kong Cheongsam Making Technique”) to demonstrate the craftsmanship and tailoring processes of three types of men's cheongsam. These were compared with the men's cheongsam relics collected from the local community for craftsmanship analysis, aiming to outline the craftsmanship and dress form of the attire. It is expected that the findings of the research can be applied to the inheritance and related practices of “Hong Kong Cheongsam Making Technique”, contributing to the protection of the intangible cultural heritage of Hong Kong.