Luxury? What it means in China

Luxury is spreading in China. The Bentley dealership in Beijing is, on a good day, one of the busiest in the world.

Louis Vuitton has opened stores even in second-tier cities like Chengdu and Xi'an, away from the prosperous coast.

Last year, the company held one of its four 150-year anniversary galas in Hong Kong (the others were in New York, Paris, and Tokyo), and it recently opened a giant, fancy new flagship store in downtown Shanghai.

But closer examination reveals luxury in China is a specific sort of luxury and, in fact, rather different from the notion of luxury in today's developed economies.

Arguably, the concept of luxury itself has mutated considerably over time. The first, earliest incarnation of luxury is still best represented by expensive, handmade products -- a Rolls-Royce car, a Patek Philippe watch.

Ownership and display are the point.

Over time, however, just as countries moved from monarchies to democracies, luxe became mass luxury: Rolex and LV try to keep the aura of old luxe but market it to more people. (Patek makes about 10,000 watches a year; Rolex more than 100,000.)

The point, however, stayed the same: owning and displaying. This is the type of luxury we find in China today.

Yet luxury mutated further in the West over the past few decades. It became about connecting with the universe and expressing oneself; about being and enjoying, and less about owning and displaying.

David Brooks described this transition in his book Bobos in Paradise.

The new luxury is more organic and creative. BMW, a mid-market luxury brand not unlike Rolex or LV, is thus the 'ultimate driving machine.'

What's being marketed is the experience of driving, not the flaunting of social status. 'Sheer driving pleasure' is another BMW slogan. Less, at least by some measures, becomes more.

Other examples of new luxury are resorts like Aman or Banyan Tree, eco-friendly and minimalistic. Perhaps luxe's new motto could come from author E M Forster: 'Always connect' -- with yourself, with nature.

This new type of luxury is in tune with the secular modern (or post-modern) consciousness that takes few things seriously other than the environment, world peace, the plight of the poor, and generally authenticity.

These politically correct exceptions aside, irony is important. First-generation luxury items can be mixed with low-end, even vulgar artefacts to reach an unexpected effect.

Prada has understood this, in its use of artificial fabrics, as have consumers in Japan and Hong Kong, who mix high and low fashion with abandon.

This was what Suzy Menkes, the veteran fashion editor of the International Herald Tribune, discovered on a recent visit to Hong Kong.

Alain Silverstein and Gerald Genta make watches that are expensive but full of irony (Genta has a Mickey Mouse watch). If I were an advertising or entertainment executive, that's the watch I would wear.

In another sense, the new luxury item is time, since identifying the products that perfectly express one's individuality takes time and accumulated knowledge, whereas going after a well-known brand is easy, even automatic.

Yet this is not fully true. We all have some free time; the question is how we spend it. Having interests, passions, hobbies -- choosing to spend our time in their pursuit -- is the foundation of contemporary conceptions of luxury.

Meaning is important: the product has to mean something, to speak of something; it cannot just be itself. Knowing small, dirty but oh-so-tasty restaurants half the world across is another expression of the new luxury.

I have a friend who, aside from being a successful financier, knows more about Taiwan butterflies that any lay person.

Practising yoga is another, ever more popular, example, and understanding Ashtanga versus Pilates, and spending time in India or elsewhere learning it, makes an important difference.

Maybe what has happened can be described as the internalisation of luxury. In the developed West, sales of ultra-luxury cars like the Rolls-Royce are dramatically down.

Its new Phantom saloon has disappointed. DaimlerChrysler's introduction of the Maybach is considered a failure. Instead, as The Economist noted recently, luxury boats are ever more popular, but these sit moored in marinas or are sailed on the high seas.

Neither environment lends itself to sending signals of conspicuous wealth. Fast car sales are strong, too, but again, the emphasis is on the enjoyment of driving as much as, if not more than, on showing off.

And fast cars are meant to be driven on meandering coastlines or in the countryside, away from crowded areas, where onlookers might be impressed.

In this paradigm, China overwhelmingly embraces traditional, in-your-face luxury: diamond-studded gold watches, Western brand names, large limousines.

Luxury is primarily about projecting status. Sports cars are scarce. Marina after marina project has failed along the Guangdong coast. (One marina that hopes to succeed suggests businesspeople entertain guests on their boats, and impress them in the process, rather than take the yachts out at sea.)

Opulence is in: one official built a $50-million replica of the 17-century Château Maisons-Lafitte on farmland near Beijing. More down-to-earth residential compounds, albeit with names like 'Buckingham Palace' and featuring statues of medieval knights flanking grand entrances, have sprung up around the country.

DTC, as DeBeers is now called, has successfully introduced the idea of diamond rings in a culture where it didn't existed before; today, penetration rates in Chinese cities exceed those in Japan.

Visually, China has never been a minimalist culture, as visits to the country's palaces and temples show. There is a preference for the grand rather than the understated.

Little matter that the grand, upon closer inspection, may be full of flaws -- say, poor finishing on a building that looks impressive from afar.

Japan and Korea, in contrast, exhibit a much simpler aesthetic. And the social definition of identity in Chinese culture, which emphasises the way the individual relates to others, promotes the outward expression of success.

Daoism, which prized humility and low profile, didn't become a mainstream school of thought. One result, for example, is that BMW uses a different advertising campaign in China, having found it difficult to translate its inner-enjoyment-of-driving concept to a Chinese audience that downplays personal pleasure for the purpose of conveying success to others.

Expensive Western brands whose products are strictly for personal or intimate use have found it more difficult to crack the Chinese market.

Luxury can denote both wealth and sophistication. The two can go hand in hand, but not necessarily. Sophistication takes time. A recent Hong Kong movie, Yesterday Once More, starring Andy Lau, a veteran star, features very little action and much minutiae on jewels, decanters, and humidors.

It works rather well -- Hong Kong and Mr Lau himself have decades of experience in the matter. In China, however, sophistication is only gradually accruing. The levels of charity donations, a corollary of luxury and sophistication, are still low.

Yet yoga schools, more stylish and organically architected housing (pioneered by SOHO, a Beijing property developer), and other 'softer' forms of luxury are also growing in popularity.

Cigar divans may be a novelty at first (a popular one overlooks the Forbidden City), but over time they become more natural destinations. The early popularity of nouveau-riche luxury may be giving way to something more complex.