Designer Vivienne Tam attends her 2014 Fall/Winter collection presentation during New York Fashion Week February 9, 2014. [Photo/Agencies]

Runway dream

Vivienne Tam 2014 Fall/Winter collection

Users were able to participate in a real-time group chat, with a select few being the lucky recipients of front-row seats and backstage access at the show. The WeChat promotion also allowed aspiring models to take to the catwalk, in an unprecedented move designed to appeal to young Chinese fashionistas. Tam believes they are becoming increasingly sophisticated.

"Chinese people are changing so quickly," Tam says. "I really feel that Chinese shoppers are beginning to understand quality, and the Internet has changed the way they look at things and the way they shop. In China, companies used to compete purely on price, but now they are competing and promoting creativity in different processes. As a result, people in China are looking more into Chinese products."

It wasn't always this way, Tam says. The designer, who was born in Guangzhou and raised in Hong Kong, relocated to New York after college out of necessity, she says. When she began designing clothing, Chinese buyers were only interested in Western luxury brands.

"From the beginning, I wanted to change the way people looked at Chinese culture," she says. "They said, 'You'll never succeed, because you're Chinese and you're using your Chinese name, designing clothing inspired by Chinese culture.'"

Tam's 1995 "Mao" collection is now installed in the permanent archives of Pittsburgh's Andy Warhol Museum and New York's Museum of FIT.

Tam previously collaborated with companies for the Chinese market. In 2012, she designed special amenities for Chinese visitors to the Hilton Hotel chain, for its "Hilton Huanying" program. Other US brands including Valentino and Burberry have also moved to target Chinese customers, holding off-season shows and events in China, and live-streaming fashion shows for Chinese audiences.

Tam is working on a line of household items and is thinking about a fashion line inspired by China's ancient Dunhuang Cave drawings, she says.

"I'm so excited to encourage people to look into our own culture, because there's so much to explore in bringing Chinese history and culture into a modern context," she says. "To see all these changes now, I'm very happy about this moment."