“What is left after beauty decays?” That was the fascinating prompt from designers Liushu “Shushu” Lei and Yutong “Tong Tong” Jiang, who’ve built an aesthetically concise and tightly packaged world at Shushu/Tong, a brand is synonymous with a certain kind of prettiness—prim, sophisticated, put together. 

This season, they appeared eager to challenge those ideals, and the exercise made for a compelling collection that was satisfying and at times even surprising. After the show, Shushu said that the duo had pushed themselves to explore different fabrications and materials. Ten years in, the pair have a robust body of work—there’s no better time to play around. 

Not coincidentally, this Shanghai Fashion Week was full of milestone anniversaries. Labelhood, the retail-cum-incubator that has helped establish labels like Shushu/Tong, celebrated its 20th season, and Samuel Guì Yang also marked a decade in business. The city’s fashion industry is still young, but some of its defining talents are formidable, and Shushu/Tong is one of its more influential. Their peers often pick up on their cues—a little flared dress, a painstakingly embellished blazer, the power of a well-placed logo. So this season, Lei and Jiang turned their signatures upside down.

What in the past would have been peplums in wool crepe or suiting fabric became layers and layers of light cotton, dyed to appear as if aged. The most body-hugging silhouettes came cut in leather (a tailored cocktail dress, a paneled skirt), while lace dresses were worn over contrasting underwear. Sheaths, cut looser than usual, were styled over colorful brassieres or on top of cropped knit sweaters. The whole thing was cooler and more nuanced.