Yu Chen’s celebrated “Red Babies” series, first created in 1999,communicates with unpredictable visuals in the spirit of postmodernism. Yu Chen’s baby motif is overtly frank, in keeping with the unabashed nature of infancy. Her palette of bright, brash red also exudes a raw emotional quality.

For its Spring-Summer 2006 collection, Shanghai Tang commissioned several well-known Chinese artists to create designs and, in turn, asked students at China’s most prestigious art academy to create artworks based on fabrics from the collection.

As part of its twentieth anniversary year, Shanghai Tang collaborated with the contemporary London-based Shanghainese artist Jacky Tsai to create a series of original artworks. Inspired by the vibrant beauty of nature, the six pieces are filled with colorful energy and reflect the optimism of modern China.

In May 2010, the controversial Chinese performance artist Li Wei wrapped the Shanghai Tang boutique at 1881 Heritage in bright pink fabric and titled the work Take Away. The artist’s intention was to touch on the human desire of wanting, and in that wanting there are no limits. For Li Wei, the concept of a “Take Away” is a deliberate contradiction of how a regular take-away refers to the bringing home of leftovers. In this project, his desire for everything that consumerism has to offer prompted him to not limit his choices in terms of what he could take, but instead to wrap up the entire Shanghai Tang boutique and take everything with him,  symbolizing how the brand bursts with gift ideas and treasures for all.

Over the past decade, Chen Man has risen to become China’s preeminent fashion photographer and visual artist. Her first collaboration with Shanghai Tang came with the brand’s advertising campaign for its Fall-Winter 2011 collection, “From China With LOVE". An exploration of the new and the old, the collection celebrated China’s dynastic return to a world of luxury where modern individualism is celebrated and heritage is treasured. Chen Man
photographed the celebrities Hu Bing and Lin Chiling on a romantic rediscovery of modern China. The highly cinematic images captured a journey through the enchanting juxtapositions of ancient and modern-day Beijing. Chen’s second campaign for Shanghai Tang came with the Spring-Summer 2012 collection, “The Rite of the Phoenix,” a celebration of the rebirth of modern China.

Staged to look like vintage movie stills,  Shya’s colorful and seductive series of photographs blended retro aesthetics with modern art to deliver a truly unique visual  experience evocative of 1930s Shanghai.