People's Architecture
	BIO  |  QUOTE     WANG YIYANG In China a new generation of office leaders and business men are growing, but in Shanghai they don't have enough character. Beijing is sometimes a bit better. In Shanghai the middle class is a large group, while in Beijing the top and the bottom are larger, not the middle. In Shanghai the white collar workers read the fashion magazines and all want the same life. Sometimes when I look around and I walk through some of the old streets in Shanghai, I like to watch the old people, because they wear, sometimes in a confusing way, clothes that are probably not considered as fashion, but are original I think. I believe fashion in China is still in the initial stage, China is learning, we don't have an own language yet and most people spend time learning, maybe wanting to be like the Western people. Cha Gang, some people explain this word as teapot. But it is not really a teapot; cha means tea, and gang container. It is thus combined a special container for tea. Cha Gang is a basic item of the 1970s. In that time everybody worked for the country so the work was not that hard, and very slow. When the people were working, they read the newspaper and had a cup of tea. Some of them could just sit for the whole day and do nothing else. Everybody had their cup of water, or tea, in a container made of different materials, some in glass, some in plastic, and with a diversity of shapes. But all similar in the way they drank from it or took it with them to a variety of places; when going to the bath or to work. Everybody had such a container. Thus Cha Gang is not really a teapot, but something that is very personal, and of which the shape is free. It could even be a can of Coca Cola that you finish, and then use to put water in. This is Cha Gang. I like this name very much, because it represents really what I want to do; the form can be free, the material can be changed and the inside can differ; water, beer, coffee, tea, & but the relationship is always the same. Wang Yiyang | fashion designer, interview with People's Architecture, Shanghai, November 16, 2006