Pres. Park charms China with colorful jackets

President Park Geun-hye charmed the Chinese continent through her “politics of jackets.” While paying a state visit to China from Thursday to Sunday last week, Park changed her jackets in different colors including pink, yellow, white and purple, leading the mood among male officials who were mostly wearing achromatic colors. Fashion experts in Korea also concurred that “Park Geun-hye style jackets” were the best item that illustrated her messages.

Experts say that Park displayed sense of comfort and confidence by picking jackets that are starkly different from those she wore during her visit to the U.S. in May. The best example is the pink jacket she wore when she met with Chinese President Xi Jinping and his wife on Friday. Unlike Park’s practice of wearing trench coats or suit jackets that evolved from men’s apparel, she wore a jacket with feminine look and soft design with a rounded collar and slim waist on the day.

“A female leader’s picking apparel colors, the most feminine, is testament to self-confidence suggesting that she no longer needs to display charisma through clothing,” said color Image stylist Yoon Hye-mi. “She seems to have overcome the pressure of her desire to show herself as a strong president by insisting on rigid style.” Yoon added, “President Park apparently was wary of Chinese first lady Peng Liyuan, who is dubbed ‘Asian fashionista,’ and even when President Park is wearing the pink jacket, she looks powerful as a leader.

The yellow jacket she wore at the summit had a higher chroma. Kang Jin-joo, director of the personal image research institute, said, “While President Park picked blue color displaying a business-like look, she chose yellow color presenting the feel of lemon and comfort, and removed rigidness this time” said Hwang Seon-ah, senior researcher at Inter Fashion Planning. “She seems to have picked mostly yellow and red color that Chinese people consider auspicious in a gesture of consideration of the country she visited.”

Prof. Kan Ho-seop, honorary chairman of the Korea-China fashion industry association, picked as the best item the white jacket that Park wore when arriving at Beijing Capital Airport on Thursday. “When she walked down the stairs of her flight against the backdrop of the Taegeuk mark of the plane, she reminded people of geon-gon-gam-ri marks on Taegeukgi (Korean national flag),” Kan said. “It was a choice that was simple and clear.”