Sexy and practical fashions for mid-summer

By Wang Yu

With record-setting temperatures, Beijing is now at its worst. In a season marked by intense heat and humidity, light clothing may be the only escape from intense sweating.

Whether you’re trying to show off your hard work at the gym or find relief on your sweltering lunch break, this week’s guest fashion editor has tips on how to balance comfort and your appearance.

 

Animal prints

What he says?

“If my girlfriend wore animal prints I would pass out. The patterns are just too tacky. Look at the kinds of people who wear animal-print skirts on the street. That kind of cheap, trashy look is a guaranteed disaster.”

– Andy Zhu, bank employee

Fashion advice

In Nina Garcia’s The One Hundred: A Guide to the Pieces Every Stylish Woman Must Own, the fashion critic and former fashion director of Elle put clothes with animal prints on the list of essentials for urban ladies.

It’s no surprise that the patterns draw on the wild world. They are intended to make a statement: the elegant lady is dead and here is her independent counterpart.

That may have been all the rage in the 1980s, but today most animal prints are an unmistakable sign of bad taste.

 “Cheap clothes always looks cheap – especially in an animal print,” says Twiggy Song, web fashion editor of Cosmopolitan’s Chinese site.

These are not on which you should cheap out. “Buy products from big brands such as D&G and Dior,  since their designs downplay what could become a trashy look,” Song says.

And never ever wear more than one animal print unless you enjoy being laughed at.

“Keep everything else simple, elegant and sleek. You are not a lion, so don’t wear a wild mane. Animal prints may bring out your wild side, but don’t combine animal prints with a dangerously short skirt,” Song says.

The background of the pattern should be light and gentle to make it stand out. Don’t go for animal prints based on pink.