Lemaire China controversy: Braid campaign backlash explained

What happened: The controversy French fashion label Lemaire is facing backlash in China after a fragrance campaign featuring braided imagery drew comparisons to the Qing-era queue hairstyle — a symbol carrying deep historical weight for Chinese consumers. The campaign promotes Lemaire’s newly launched “Objets Senteur” collection, which comprises five home fragrance objects designed to interact subtly with domestic spaces, particularly wardrobes. The diffuser at the center of the controversy is called Tresse, the French word for braid. Braided imagery runs throughout the visuals — long gowns paired with braids, braids juxtaposed with scissors — and quickly drew criticism on Chinese social media, with many users calling it historically insensitive and insulting to China. For many in China, the combination of queue, robe and scissors recalls a fraught historical period of foreign aggression and humiliation — one in which the hairstyle, often derisively called a “pigtail” in the West, became a visual shorthand for the stereotyping of Chinese identity. Deployed without cultural context, such imagery reads less as aesthetic expression than as a casual invocation of that past, and the sensitivity it provokes reflects not overreaction but historical memory. As of April 25, the campaign visuals remained on Lemaire’s official homepage, but have since been replaced with other images from the Objets Senteur series. The brand has also removed the related content from its Xiaohongshu (also known as RedNote) and Instagram accounts. How Chinese consumers reacted to Lemaire’s apology At around 6pm China time on April 26, Lemaire issued an apology via its official Xiaohongshu account, expressing “sincere apologies” for the discomfort caused by the campaign visuals. The brand said it would treat the incident as “an important moment for reflection,” pledging to strengthen its internal cultural review processes and adopt a “more cautious, clear and respectful approach” in future creative work. Yet the damage may already be difficult to repair. Many Chinese consumers have dismissed the apology as insincere, and industry observers are skeptical that a statement alone will suffice. “An apology is only the beginning — what matters is the follow-up actions,” a senior PR practitioner told Jing Daily on condition of anonymity. “The era when a brand could make money freely without deeply engaging with local culture is over. Once a controversy breaks out, a simple statement is far from enough.” The backlash continues to spread across Chinese social media, with some users vowing to boycott the brand entirely. A post by @crossingnote Dahong, a Xiaohongshu account with around 70,000 followers, captured the mood: “All cultural expressions that make you feel uncomfortable — your intuition is often right.” It has since drawn approximately 53,000 likes and 585 comments, though the video is no longer searchable on the platform. The Jing Take: What Lemaire stands to lose Founded in Paris in 1991 by Christophe Lemaire — who later served as artistic director of womenswear at Hermès — the brand is now co-led with Sarah-Linh Tran. Its minimalist, utilitarian aesthetic has earned it a devoted following among Chinese consumers in recent years. According to Business of Fashion, revenue grew from under 10 million euros (under $11 million) in 2019 to over 100 million euros ($117 million) in 2024, with full-price sell-through of around 80% and operating margins approaching 20%. China has played a significant role in that growth. According to Navigator data, the brand’s first China store — a boutique in Chengdu’s Taikoo Li — has averaged around 7 million RMB ($960,000) in monthly sales since opening in November 2024. Lemaire opened its first Shanghai flagship in January, further underscoring its commitment to the market. Lemaire’s cultural missteps in China go beyond a single campaign Yet the expansion has not been without friction. As recently as January 2026, the Mini Fortune Croissant bag — which features braided detailing — prompted similar concerns on Xiaohongshu that went unaddressed. The Objets Senteur campaign has since reignited the issue with far greater force. The reputational damage here runs deeper than a single misstep. The braid is not a neutral aesthetic choice in China — it carries the weight of a specific historical trauma, and its repeated appearance across Lemaire campaigns signals either ignorance or indifference to that context. From the braided bag to the Objets Senteur campaign, a pattern has formed, and patterns are harder to walk back than isolated incidents. Compounding the risk is the competitive reality of the segment Lemaire occupies. Minimalist, functional fashion is not a niche. It is one of the most crowded corners of the contemporary luxury market, with credible alternatives readily available to Chinese consumers. That leaves the brand with little margin for error, and the cost of this controversy may ultimately prove far steeper than a single campaign. Implications for global luxury brands in China Lemaire’s controversy is not an isolated case. Ahead of its April 30 China release, The Devil Wears Prada 2 has drawn its own backlash over the portrayal of a Chinese assistant character — whose name, Qin Zhou, Chinese viewers say phonetically resembles a historically racist slur — as well as criticism that the character reinforces tired stereotypes about Asian women. Calls for a boycott have emerged on Weibo and other platforms. Taken together, these incidents send a clear message to global brands: as China becomes an ever more vital engine of luxury growth, cultural sensitivity cannot be confined to commercial investment alone. When creative missteps intersect with historical memory, even strong business performance may prove difficult to sustain. The Jing Take reports on a piece of the leading news and presents our editorial team’s analysis of the key implications for the luxury industry. In the recurring column, we analyze everything from product drops and mergers to heated debate sprouting on Chinese social media.

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The braid that could break Lemaire in China

How Bottega Veneta weaved China’s forever it bag