How fashion influencer and KOL Peter Xu is changing social media in China
Fed up with taking selfies and editing photos of himself to fit in with the trend of looking flawless, Xu is ditching the shallow content that permeates China’s social media fashion channels and adopting a more long-term view
Peter Xu’s ascent to Chinese fashion stardom is not quite the conventional tale. He started as an aspiring rapper and celebrity English language teacher before becoming a successful fashion influencer across multiple online platforms. He eventually became recognised as a key opinion leader (KOL) in the industry, with 1.5 million followers on Weibo.
Today, however, he is less interested in online stardom and showing off, and more in using his fame to launch his production house, Peter Xu Studio, which he established in 2016.
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“When I was a full-time blogger, around 2012 to 2015, I did a lot of selfies and very edited pictures of myself, but I hated it,” Xu explains as we sit inside a popular Japanese restaurant in Shanghai’s former French Concession. “In the China market, people prefer flawless looking guys, these xiao xian rou or ‘little fresh meat’. I didn’t like this shallow content, this one-dimensional showing off. I want to show all the sides of fashion. My plan is to work in this industry until I’m in my 70s because I love it.
“Today, the focus is now on my team, not just me. It’s about transforming the KOL model … I’ve now left that KOL star stage behind me.”
His team includes a handful of full-time workers and over 100 freelancer photographers, photo editors, producers and other creative personnel. Together they do photo and video production for lifestyle brands, shows and fashion labels, as well as the odd music video and marketing campaign.