“I hate looking like a million dollars. I want to look independent and smart — like I’m different, but not too different.” Keira Kong, a millennial Shanghai-based agent for South Korean music artists, is trying to explain her newfound love for French brand Coperni. Since designers Arnaud Vaillant and Sébastien Meyer relaunched the label in 2019, Kong has built a small wardrobe of Coperni staples, including two dresses, two tops, three jackets and a pair of trousers. She commends the brand’s tailoring, its signature asymmetric cuts and its prices (T-shirts sell for about Rmb839 on farfetch.cn, or $130).

“The fabrics are never going to be at Chanel’s level but their cut, their concept and the way they see women is never too girly,” continues Kong. “They like strong, independent women and that’s who I am trying to be.”

Like Kong, a growing number of Chinese consumers, often part of the Gen Z and millennial cohorts, are using clothing and luxury purchases to differentiate themselves from their peers. Purchases are less motivated by the older generation’s paradigm of “status” and more influenced by elements such as “identity statement”, says Federica Levato, partner at Bain & Company in Milan. This shift has opened the way for lesser-known and edgier brands to provide a point of difference from the big luxury labels now ubiquitous in the country.