top of page
B2

​Chinese Culture

​a Timeline ancient Chinese underwear

time
This is a timeline of traditional underwear from different Chinese dynasties. You can find out their histories, different styles and the name of underwear in this timeline.

click timeline to get extra information

Purpose

PP
There are three different purposes for wearing traditional lingerie. It is best known  as a protectable undergarment for not only breasts but also lady parts. Additionally, in the past people wore underwear to kept bellies warm that can prevent a cold. Nowadays,​traditional Chinese underwear  is also used for sexual pleasure. 

mouse over yellow cotents

​PROTECT PRIVATE PARTS

PREVENT A COLD

​HAVE SEX APPEAL

Appearance of ancient Chinese lingerie in different dynasties

APP
This is a visual comparison of the traditional underclothes from different time periods.

Tang Dynasty

TANG
The Tang Dynasty is best known as the most open era of times past. Take women's style of dress as a significant example: they wore luxurious clothing with a prominent décolletage and heavy makeup. This may reflect the fact that women's social rights and status during the Tang era were notably liberal-minded for the period. Additionally, it was fashionable for women to be plump or fuller figured. Men enjoyed the presence of assertive, active women.

Do you want to know makeup, hairstyles, hezi and clothing?

click four small images

TT2

​Make-up

maek-up
hair

Hair styles

Do you want to know their name?

Mouse over images

Clothing

Clothing

Do you want to know their details?

Mouse over contents

The republication period

re
The 1911 Revolution, led by Sun Yat-sen, overthrew the last feudal dynasty in Chinese history. After that, women’s statuses were rising and the social morality was more open. Women began to go to school and touch the outside culture. And then here came the lingerie called Small Vest. However, Sun Yat-sen was one of the fiercest opponents of breast binding ( small vest). "Women who use a piece of narrow cloth to flatten their breasts are denying their own beauty. Even worse, the practice is harmful to women's health, impairing their ability to breathe normally and eventually leading to lung diseases or even premature death. Moreover, bound breasts are unable to produce breast milk normally, affecting our children and the nation's next generation," he wrote. In 1927, he  raised a proposal to ban breast binding, called " Natural Breast Movement ".

the Natural breast movement

bre
The Natural Breast Movement”
By: Mo Zhu
Published in Beiyang Huabao  July 30, 1927
“In the age of improving women’s lives, the government of Guangdong province has ordered a ban on women’s breast-binding to carry out a natural breast movement…” 
bottom of page