Artisan recreates over 100 traditional costumes in beautiful presentation of Hanfu worn in China’s ancient past

After measuring original versions of the costume, and then designing patterns before cutting and sewing together pieces of cloth, Zhao Bo, an inheritor of the craft for making traditional Han-style clothing from Yongqing county, north China’s Hebei Province, completed a template for a piece of Han-style “Daopao,” or Taoist robe, in only a few minutes.

Photo shows the recreated half-sleeve garment in the style of the Tang Dynasty (618-907) as created by Zhao Bo. (Photo/Liu Xinyu)

Over the past few years, the artisan has recreated over 100 pieces of Hanfu, or Han-style costumes, which once belonged to different dynasties throughout China’s history.

Zhao started to collect Hanfu when he was just 15 years old. When he was 16, the young man independently collected an imperial garment from the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) for the first time on his own during a trip to north China’s Tianjin municipality.

Zhao became obsessed with the Hanfu culture as a university student, and he would always set off to look for other Hanfu costumes in nearby ancient townships whenever he had any time off.

Over the years, the man has collected over 2,000 Hanfu garments during his visits to more than 200 ancient townships and villages across the country, having also recreated some Hanfu costumes in the meantime.

Zhao Bo sews together a Hanfu costume. (Photo/Liu Xinyu)

Zhao once reproduced a half-sleeve garment from the Tang Dynasty (618-907), saying the work was a dream come true for him because he had always wanted to recreate a Hanfu costume in the style of the Tang Dynasty. Due to a variety of reasons, there are just a few Han-style costumes dating from the Tang Dynasty that have been well preserved up to this day.

“The half-sleeve garment was an accessory during the Tang Dynasty, being similar to a sleeveless jacket,” introduced Zhao. It took the man more than two years to eventually finish the half-sleeve garment in the Tang Dynasty style.

Zhao introduced that many fabrics he has used to recreate Hanfu costumes are not available in the market because the cloth-making techniques are very complex, and nowadays, only national-level intangible cultural heritage inheritors still make these fabrics.