In old days, much of life was lived in public, from socializing to bathing and cooking. Photo by Gao Erqiang/Shanghai Star

DIY fashion

While the children would be stuck trying to decide between potatoes and eggs, the big decision for young women was new clothes. It was an era when the whole country wore uniform deep blue jackets. Only Chinese New Year gave the city's frustrated fashionistas a reason to make something different.

Shanghai had a tradition: make a new piece of clothing, or at least a pair of cotton-filled shoes, to welcome the new year and bring you good luck. In the 1980s when society gradually opened to the outside world, Shanghai women quietly resumed their pursuit of fashion. They would usually start their foray back into fashion with a traditional brocade cotton-filled jacket featuring beautiful but complicated buttons, a refined form of qipao which had disappeared from the streets since the "Cultural Revolution" (1966-1976).

Women went to Nanjing Road, the only shopping street in the city, to select fabrics. After shopping, they would return home to show off their new purchases. Smooth brocade in various colors and patterns would be spread out on the table in the dimly lit home. Brave fashion gurus picked bright peacock blue, while conservative women would select rosy red. The moment when all the fabrics took the center stage in my home was so impressive, the scene is a never fading photo in my memory.

More economic housewives, like my mother, chose solid and cheap cotton cloth to make winter clothes for their children. In an old photo from when I was three, I stand in a very fat coat and pants, stuffed with cotton. The clothes made me look like a huge melon, growing from the soil.