“We got out of quarantine earlier,” says Mr Bohan Qiu from his office in Shanghai. “I think you can see this wave of people dressing crazier. I thought people would go back to normcore, but people were home for so long, there’s a YOLO mentality.” 

Mr Bohan Qiu, now the owner of his own creative agency, Boh Project, is an old friend of ours here at MR PORTER. He worked for four years in our Hong Kong office, spreading the good word of excellent menswear and sharp tailoring, high fashion and streetwear kicks to the good people in China, Japan, South Korea, Singapore and beyond. But, as sometimes happens, Mr Qiu felt the need to set out on his own, so he upped stakes and moved to the mainland, settling in Shanghai, the city where, according to him, it’s “all happening”.

Now, the Boh Project does a lot of everything in the world of fashion and style. He and his team produce fashion shows, work as creative directors on shoots and campaigns, produce content and do PR for brands like AMIRI and Calvin Klein as well as a variety of Shanghai-based brands. It’s a perfect set up for a man who was born in Shen Zhen, but spent time living in Vancouver, Hong Kong and Paris – an opportunity to bring his myriad experiences together in one place. 

Mr Qiu first got started in fashion when he was scouted as a model while studying politics in Paris. When he graduated, he decided to transition full time to fashion, working with MR PORTER and writing a style column in the South China Morning Post. “You could feel the creatives from China and Korea were really rising,” he says from his office in Shanghai. “The main mission of my agency is to build a new bridge between the East and West.” 

He breaks down the different cultures in the region: “Japan has been excellent with style for years, South Korea is more pop-y,” he says. But China is where there’s still space for definition, led by young people his age: “We have this generation of kids who have studied at the best schools abroad. Now, we’re trying to create what is ours, to take really strong stance.” 

For Mr Qiu that means taking his experiences living in different cities around the world and melding them into one eclectic, yet completely coherent style. “I take a little bit of something from each place and each culture: skate style from Canada, you know, the West Coast’s relaxed vibes. I love Serge Gainsbourg and the look of Parisian rock ‘n’ roll from the 1970s and 1980s. Shanghai is very modern and everything is super-fast but at the same time it’s got this colonial history and everyone here is quite elegant.” 

So, what does he call this style? “It’s skatewear meets formalwear,” he says. “A high-low mix.” We paid him – and his dog – a visit in Shanghai, saw what a week in the life of Mr Qiu might look like, and got him to explain just how he puts together that suits ‘n’ skate vibe.

“I like this shirt by Endless Joy, I remember when George Archer [Senior Buyer at MR PORTER] brought this brand in. I have a ton of these shirts with crazy prints. I think they’re super versatile. You can wear them with a suit, or in summer, and I’ve even worn one with a turtleneck underneath. Here, I’ve tied a John Elliott sweatshirt around my waist in case I get cold and these jeans are my own. Of course, I need a bright pair of socks.”

“Dogs in Shanghai are very chic, so you have to put on a perfect ensemble when you’re walking your dog. In the area where the office is, everyone is super style-focused. I’ve seen dogs with Prada nylon down jackets or 1017 ALYX 9SM dog collars. This is my casual dog-walking look, but I still gotta look good, so I’m wearing Wacko Maria, loose-fit trousers and sneakers. Plus, a big scarf since it’s easy to wrap around, but still functional to move around in and cool look.”

“I have such a huge attachment to Mr P. because I was doing all the launch planning and we presented it to all of Asia. It has really good staples and I’m happy to see that it’s growing into a rich and diverse brand. This Beams F suit has a French vibe. Old Shanghai people dress like this, in this very stylish way. They’ll put on a fedora and wear really cool sunglasses, so it’s an old Shanghai/French style. Loose trousers and white sneakers are an easy day look. I’d wear it to work and then go straight to dinner.”

“As I mentioned, rock guys are a big influence to me and I have this thing for animal prints. So this is a very rock ‘n’ roll outfit that you can wear easily in the city. I’m also a big fan of Chelsea boots; that aesthetic is always at the core of my style. It really works anytime. In Shanghai, there’s less of a construct of what you wear day or night – it’s stricter in London – but here, you can kind of show up to a techno club or a lunch meeting in this outfit. Style is freer for us to explore.”

“This is a Husbands suit paired with a Stüssy shirt. The loud print kind of breaks the tradition of how you wear a suit. I’m also wearing a tie as a neck scarf… no one wears ties these days. I would wear this to a party, to dinner. Nowadays, you don’t have to wear a suit to work, so where do you wear a suit? I kind of flip it: during the week I dress super casual and on the weekend I’ll wear a blazer to get a coffee.”