With the ongoing World Expo that lasts for 6 months, all eyes on Shanghai, including the world’s largest fashion designers such as Chanel, Prada and Dior.

Chanel launched the Paris-Shanghai collection which consists of its signature flap bag, tweed jacket and pumps in hot red, it also includes a line-up of jackets and dresses inspired by mainly the late Coco Chanel’s infatuation towards Chinese arts and her collection despite the fact that she never visited China for once in her life. My biggest problem with the whole thing is in a small detail in Karl Lagerfeld’s attempt to create a short film based on Chanel’s dream trip to Shanghai by casting two non-Chinese actors who pretended to be ones but can’t properly say “hen mei” (how beautiful!) in the correct tone making it very annoying everytime they said it.

Prada, on the other hand, launched a campaign based on black-white images and short film, titled “First Spring”. Miuccia also launched a line of colorful Prada Shanghai nylon bags with appliques, which I see more of “Alice in the Wonderland” than Shanghai.

Dior uses the skyline of the Shanghai famous Bund and Pearl Tower as the background of its campaign featuring Marion Cotillard with the Lady Dior bag and a male Chinese model. There will also be a short film on this.