25/08/2026
Nostalgic hardware, slow beadwork, and unfiltered memory.
For Guangzhou-based designer Yueqi Qi, technology isn’t cold—it’s emotional. Her recent collections fuse hyper-feminine aesthetics with Y2K tech relics, wrapping beaded jewelry around headsets, headphones, and vintage Walkmans.
“They’re still technology, but they start to feel like jewelry carrying memories,” Yueqi explains. “I love the contrast between something technological and something made very slowly by hand.”
Drawing inspiration from dreamy cinema, blurred memories, and street-level discoveries, Yueqi balances digital imagination with physical craftsmanship:
AI as a Creative Sandbox.
She uses AI to quickly map out feelings and images that are hard to explain, before translating them into physical garments, sets, and textiles.
“AI is another creative tool. Sometimes I have an image or a feeling in my head that’s difficult to explain, and AI helps me explore that world very quickly. Then I can take something from that process and translate it back into something physical—whether it becomes a garment, a material, a set, a photograph, or something completely different. One moment I might be developing a garment, and the next I’m thinking about styling, making an image, designing a graphic, or imagining how the whole story should be presented.”
Being steps away from manufacturing allows her team to source unexpected materials, test ideas in real time, and iterate without friction.
“We can find a strange material, bring it back to the studio, experiment with it, change our minds, and try something completely different very quickly. That immediacy gives me a lot of freedom to experiment, which is very important to the way I work.”
Outside the Calendar
Stepping off the traditional fashion calendar, she releases work only when there’s a real story to tell:“I want to make things when I actually have something to say, not just because the calendar says it’s time.”
Follow Yueqi Qi and visit their official site to explore new drops, global stockists, and behind-the-scenes processes—because sometimes the journey is even more interesting than the final image.