Weekend Wear: Here’s How to Ring in the Lunar New Year Looking Fly AF
In case you couldn’t tell by my hyphenated, impossible-to-pronounce name, I’m Chinese. A young Chinese person, if you will. Tomorrow, you may have heard, is the first day of Chinese New Year. *CLIPSE BREAK*
I’m in for a whole lot of family, food, and rubber band stacks this weekend, and I couldn’t be more thrilled about it. But before I get there, there’s one pesky task standing in my way: I need to find myself a red shirt. You see, one long-standing CNY requirement, at least in the Goh household, is that we all have to wear a brand new item of red clothing — red symbolizing good fortune, and the newness symbolizing something my mum has probably explained to me a half-dozen times and will be annoyed by when she reads this and sees that I’ve forgotten.
This is not as simple a task as it sounds: believe it or not, cool red shirts aren’t that easy to come by. The only people who wear red shirts regularly are creeps, drive-thru servers, and dead men walking. It’s been an ongoing annual struggle for as long as I can remember.
Things have gotten easier of late, though, with a whole bunch of designers and brands launching their very own Chinese New Year-inspired capsule collections. I can’t say for certain why they’ve decided to do this, but it sure makes my life a lot less difficult. Here’s an outfit using a bunch of stuff from those capsules.
1. Moncler Didier Bomber Jacket, $1,400
I was a little hesitant to include this because Moncler’s website chose to promote their Chinese New Year line with a giant graphic that reads “ORIENTAL FASCINATION,” which made me super uncomfortable. But, you know, it’s pretty cool, so I caved. The jacket is reversible, but the flip-side has a massive gaudy rooster embroidery on the back, so it’s actually not reversible at all.
2. Levi’s Graphic Crew Sweatshirt, $80
See, Moncler? Now this is how you work in the whole “Year of the Rooster” theme. With a clever, vintage-looking graphic on a classic crewneck sweatshirt. Good job by you, Levi’s.
3. Toronto Raptors x Mitchell & Ness CNY Dad Hat, $40
The Raps will be rocking really dope Chinese New Year uniforms during a couple of games next week. But since I probably can’t show up to a family dinner in a basketball jersey, this cap will have to suffice. (And yes, Mum, I’ll take it off at the table.)
4. Norse Projects Slim Denim, $250
Turns out, not a lot of designers made Chinese New Year-inspired pants. (Levi’s did, obviously, but we already included that sweatshirt. No double dipping.) So here is just a very nice pair of jeans that I would like to own. Moving on.
5. Air Jordan XII “Chinese New Year”, $TBD
Everyone from Adidas to Puma dropped crazy tight, limited-edition kicks for CNY this year. But I had to include this incredible take on my all-time favourite sneaker — the Air Jordan XII “Taxi” — with premium materials, gold accents and Chinese characters embroidered on the tongue. These puppies are releasing tomorrow at select Foot Locker locations — plug your postal code into this page for more details.
6. Michael Kors Gold-Tone Rooster Key Charm, $36
Michael Kors’ Year of the Rooster collection consisted of, like, a dozen eye-catching purses and wallets for the ladies, and this one dinky key chain for us dudes. Gee, thanks Mike, you shouldn’t have.
