As the Year of the Rabbit approaches, bunny-themed collaborations are starting to trickle in. One standout has to be American clothing brand Tommy Hilfiger, which incorporated the globally-loved IP of Miffy the Rabbit for the occasion, launching a 50-piece clothing capsule on December 12.
Lunar New Year highlights, as seen in the latest issue of Jing Daily’s Collabs and Drops newsletter, also included Chinese luxury brand Nexy.Co’s rabbit exhibition with local artist Deng Yu. G-Shock, on the other hand, partnered with artist-led brand Melting Sadness and embraced its rabbit Karoro character, creating takes on the watchmaker’s DW-5600, DW-6900, and Baby-G BA-110 designs.
Check out our verdict on each of those below, and subscribe here for weekly brand collaboration updates straight to your inbox.
MELTING SADNESS X G-SHOCK#
Launch Date
December 1
Trend:#
Global Brand x Local Brand
The verdict
This marks the first time that playful Chinese brand Melting Sadness has worked with global watch name G-Shock. Incorporating the Karoro character's blue color and carrot for the watchband design, the collaboration taps into Melting Sadness’ best elements — in an interview with Jing Daily, the streetwear founder Zhang Quan said it is the characters that win over his fanbase most. For G-Shock, working with a local brand for Chinese New Year is a great way to celebrate, especially as Melting Sadness has such a solid following in the mainland (519k followers on Weibo). Plus, it's Karoro's year, being the Year of the Rabbit.
NEXY.CO X DENG YU#
Launch Date
December 1
Trend:#
Luxury Local Name x Local Artist
The verdict
Due to its relatively big following, Chinese luxury brand Nexy.co has finessed the social media campaign of this collaboration — at the time of writing, the hashtag #Zodiac Year of the Rabbit Joint Series# has 296,000 reads and #NEXY.CO邓瑜# has almost 2,000 on Weibo. At the Shanghai train station, this art exhibition by local artist Deng Yu is a great photo opportunity, inviting consumers to celebrate the Year of the Rabbit. Working with an artist is not only a great way to connect with Generation Z in the mainland, but it also allows Nexy.Co to reinvigorate its brand image with fresh creativity.
3125C X ALAIA CHEN X STEIFF#
Launch Date
December 14
Trend:#
Streetwear Name x Collectible
The verdict
Clot founder Edison Chen's daughter Alaia Chen is already a designer at five years old, with this “PANDA BEARRY CUTE” toy dedicated to her favorite stuffed teddy bears. Thanks to Edison's proud posts of his daughter on his Instagram (3 million followers), Alaia has become a public figure among Chen's fanbase and has even attended New York Fashion Week. The young creative had full design control as it is based upon a painting that she created, with purple and pink being her favorite colors. As Steiff bears are already collectibles, this feeds Clot's cultural capital and positioning in art toys. In China, Steiff already has a solid consumer base (33k followers on Weibo), one that is more mainstream than Edison Chen's; however, this marks the first of its Chinese collaborations.
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