Dolce & Gabbana Shanghai Show canceled, Chinese celebrities flee Furor – WWD

SHANGHAI – An hour-long, multi-million dollar parade, planned here by Dolce & Gabbana was brutally canceled the same day, after insults against China were posted to the Instagram account designer Stefano Gabbana, which has brought the biggest names in the country in the fashion and entertainment sector. on attending the show en masse. The creator and brand released Wednesday afternoon a few hours from the scheduled event, indicating that the account had been hacked.

In the screenshots published by Diet Prada, the verified story of Stefano Gabbana was sent with messages saying, "From now on throughout the interview [sp] that I will do international, I will say that the country of [series of poop emojis] is China "and" China Ignorant Dirty Smelling Mafia ", among other insults.

The list of VIP guests expected for 21h. #DGGreatShow began to collapse as messages circulated on social media. The actress Zhang Ziyi said that she would not participate in the event, stating on her official Weibo account that "Starting today, Miss Zhang and her team will Will not buy or use any D & G products. "

The singer Wang Junkai as well as the actors Li Bingbing, Chen Kun, Dilraba and the group of girls Rocket Girls 101 also participated in the demonstration. The Chinese actor-singer Huang Xiaoming wrote on his official Weibo account: "The homeland is the first."

Related story: Celebrities and Chinese models flee the fury after the cancellation of the Dolce & Gabbana show in Shanghai

The China Bentley Modeling agency has issued an official statement in which it says that 24 of its models who planned to march in the show were boycotting the event. Many Chinese heritage models posted "no me" on their casting photos, including Lynden Ly who told Weibo that he and others behind the scenes had spent all night rehearsing . He added that although it was the only show he had to walk this month, he would refuse to do it.

The 10 most currently used search terms on Weibo are related to the Dolce and Gabbana controversy.

The brand and Gabbana both apologized and claimed that the messages came from hacking.

"My Instagram account has been hacked. My legal office is working on that. I love China and Chinese culture. I'm really sorry about what happened, "wrote Gabbana on his personal page.

The fashion house also published on social networks: "Our Instagram account has been hacked. The same goes for Stefano Gabbana. Our legal office is conducting an urgent investigation. We are sorry for any distress caused by these unauthorized messages. We only have respect for China and the Chinese people. "

The controversy began three days earlier when the brand began publishing a series of three videos titled "Eating with Chopsticks" on its social media pages. The videos show an Asian model who learns, in Mandarin, to eat pizza, cannoli and spaghetti in voiceover.

The videos have hurt people in China, many people in the country using social media to denounce what they describe as a sexist and racist connotation. The video shows an Asian model trying to eat cannoli, while the voiceover says, "Is it too big for you?" The model also tries to eat the dishes using chopsticks. In addition, the use of an obsolete market-like stall, with lantern and awning, has also led many Chinese netizens to wonder if the brand only wanted to depict a retrograde image of the country, which was a starting point. conflict before.

The video series has remained on the brand's Instagram, Facebook and Twitter pages, although it no longer appears on the official brand account on the Weibo Chinese social media platform. The screenshots of the original Weibo publication have been widely shared.

The insults of Gabbana's account were responses to criticisms regarding promotional videos. The messages posted indicated that the designer remained faithful to the videos and that it was the Chinese local team that had withdrawn the advertisements, which he did not approve, before embarking on a rant against China.

The creator is known for frequently maintaining social media relationships with followers, including his vocal support for dressing up the first American lady, Melania Trump, by insulting singer Selena Gomez.

This is not the first time Dolce & Gabbana has been in hot water country as part of its ongoing marketing campaign, #DGLovesChina. Last April, Chinese social media became more enlightened in response to a Dolce & Gabbana advertising campaign shot in Beijing. The shoot featured the city's older neighborhoods rather than the modern cityscape, as the brand had already done in other Asian cities. At the time, images from this Beijing advertising campaign had also been removed from Dolce & Gabbana's official account at Weibo.

China is a key market for the luxury brand. According to a report released by McKinsey last year, by 2025, 7.6 million Chinese households will account for one trillion billion renminbi in global luxury sales.