Huishan Zhang Resort 2025 Collection

Huishan Zhang loves a glamorous muse almost as much as he loves a good story. In Song Huai-Kuei—the late Chinese artist and socialite who was better known as Madame Song, a pivotal figure who introduced Pierre Cardin to China and brought European designers into the wardrobes of Chinese women when such a thing was unheard of—he found both.

Song’s legacy was celebrated in an exhibition last year at Hong Kong’s M+ museum, and one of Zhang’s cheongsam dresses was included as part of a section on contemporary Chinese designers, leading him to base this resort collection on her influence. “In my imagination, if she were still alive today, she could become our client and I could make her dresses,” he said, speaking from Qingdao over a video call to his boutique in London’s Mount Street.

Like modern-day Madame Songs, Huishan Zhang’s clients are international women who need to be able to move through the world with ease, demanding practical, elegant clothing that can take them from a shopping trip on the Champs Élysées or the Bund to dinner in Abu Dhabi.

Pastel-colored separates come in lightweight neoprene (a Zhang staple) that will spring out of a suitcase with ease. Dresses are crafted from substantial denim, swishy scarlet tulle, or scattered with goose feathers to match the mood, while the über-neat tailoring sharpens things up. Nods to Song came through again in the floral embellishments and jeweled details that decorate lapels and dresses, which Zhang explained were inspired by Song’s extensive jewelry and brooch collection.

It’s a feast to behold, and Zhang is wise to temper some of the more saccharine impulses. The asymmetrical half bows that belt some of the coats and dresses were a clever example: “We take the element [of a bow], but we don’t want to be too literal by actually putting a bow there,” he said.

Still, however much the Zhang woman needs everyday staples to see her through life, the knockouts from the collection were the evening dresses embellished with cobwebs of crystals. You might think that the number of beads would weigh such a garment down, but Zhang thought of that too. “It’s actually very light,” he said. “We think about how she’s going to wear it and how it looks when she sits down, so we deliberately don’t [embellish] the back.” A detail that Song herself would have appreciated.