s I enter Stephanie J. Hu ’26’s dorm on the 10th floor of Mather Tower, an aroma of pine and cedarwood immediately hits me. A Thymes candle is lit in the corner, her overhead lights are off, and two large traditional Chinese scripts hang proudly on the wall opposite her bed, boasting scenes of mountains, water, and flowers. These, Stephanie will later reveal, were hand-painted by her grandmother, who recently took up the hobby of traditional Chinese painting.

Greeting me at the door, Stephanie wears a blue and black spotted COS cardigan, black slacks from a Chinese brand, and socks gifted to her by one of her past managers at Adidas, where she worked over the summer. Her jewelry consists of a pendant stone necklace that was a birthday gift from a friend, a silk-braided necklace from a flea market in Baltimore, and rings from Mexico City, Turkey, Lisbon, and Thailand.

Though she was born in upstate New York, Stephanie moved to Taiwan and China at a very early age, where she spent her childhood and middle school years before moving back to California for high school. Her parents still live in China, and she still calls the country home. “A lot of the jewelry that I have is inspired by Chinese art, and some tops or pants or clothing that I have will also have, for example, a Chinese collar,” Stephanie says.

As we talk, she mentions her schoolbag hanging on her wall like a decor piece: a black leather shoulder strap slouchy bag with gold metals from a Chinese brand, Songmont. Her favorite makeup brand is the Asian-American brand Tower 28, and her favorite scent from her perfume collection is “Wood of Life” by the Chinese brand Beast — a gender-neutral scent with musky notes that she also gifted to her dad.

For Stephanie, who founded the international activism non-profit Dear Asian Youth at age 16, her relationship with Chinese culture has been a journey. She noted a “huge cultural shock” upon first moving to the U.S. as a teenager. Founding the non-profit organization was a way for her to embrace her identity and connect with others proud of their identity, she says, which also led her to experiment with Chinese fashion.

A sociology concentrator, Stephanie is working on a thesis about neo-Chinese fashion, a popular design movement in China that incorporates traditional Chinese aesthetics into modern or Western design principles. Stephanie notes that growing up in China in the 2010s, Western styles were often favored over Chinese styles. Since the Covid-19 pandemic, she has noticed a significant increase in neo-Chinese fashion.

“Why, now, is this fashion movement becoming so popular? What does this say about a modern Chinese identity? And then relating a lot of that to a sense of nationalism, a sense of cultural pride that is rising amidst U.S.-China relations. So looking at fashion from that lens — how it is shaped by, and reflects and also constructs a modern Chinese identity,” Stephanie says.

For Stephanie, clothing and fashion are enough to speak to someone’s identity. Fashion choices are both a practical and symbolic endeavor for her: by incorporating fashion into her academic pursuits, Stephanie considers how clothing can be a deliberate presentation of one’s ethnicity, gender, and life interests.

Stephanie has also experimented with creative marketing as a potential career path with companies like Adidas and Cartier. The fast-paced environment and the chance to work with like-minded people who also paid “attention to the little details of the way someone was presenting themselves” drew her to these industries.

“I loved being around people who were literally throwing fits every single day,” she says. “Walking in, it was like a fashion show.”

But Stephanie was not always as interested in fashion as she is now. Although her mom has “really great fashion taste,” when Stephanie started dressing herself in elementary school, she spent several years only wearing athleisure and flannels. “It’s not my best moment. I grew out of it.”

Today, many of her clothes are passed down from her mom — when she gives me a closet tour, she immediately points out two inherited coats. Stephanie also shows me her favorite green fur coat, which she acquired at an estate sale in Southern California, and another fur coat she bought from a girl on the streets in New York City. Coats and shoes are her favorite types of clothing to buy, perhaps because she loves thrifting fun, high-quality, “diva energy” outerwear.

“One thing about me is I never wear sneakers,” Stephanie says.

—Magazine Editor-at-Large Vivian W. Rong can be reached at [email protected].