Traditional Chinese wedding dress

What the name covers

Traditional Chinese wedding dress is a collective term. It gathers the different forms and styles of wedding clothing worn by Han Chinese people at their marriage ceremony, within the wider customs of traditional Chinese marriage. No single outfit stands for all of it. From the Zhou dynasty onward, national laws and rules governed grades of clothing and of personal ornaments. Those rules produced distinct categories of dress, and wedding attire grew up inside them. The sets described here follow the yichang system, an upper garment worn with a lower one. That pairing gives each of these wedding outfits its basic shape, whichever dynasty it comes from.

The fengguan xiapei

The fengguan xiapei is a Hanfu wedding set worn in the Ming and Qing dynasties. It follows the yichang system, an upper and a lower garment. In Qing times the upper piece was an ao called mangao, or python jacket, red in colour and cut as a yuanlingshan in Ming style. The lower piece, the mangchu or python skirt, was red or green and embroidered with dragons and phoenixes across the front and back lapel. The set takes its name from two accessories: the fengguan, a kind of guan or headgear, and the xiapei, a long scarf or stole in the Ming dynasty that became a waistcoat under the Qing. After the wedding, married women wore the set on formal occasions, with trousers or leggings instead of the skirt.

The qungua

The qungua, also called longfenggua, guaqun or longfeng qungua, follows the yichang system too: a jacket, the gua, over a long qun that is either straight cut or pleated at the sides. Wearing it as a wedding dress began in the Qing dynasty in the 18th century. The work was slow, so the bride's mother would start sewing it when her daughter was born, and it would be handed to the bride later as part of the dowry from her family. Five grades exist, Guahuang, Guahou, Dawufu, Zhongwufu and Xiaowufu, ranked by how much embroidery covers the dress. The qungua is made commercially now and remains a popular wedding dress.

The Xiuhefu

The Xiuhefu also follows the yichang system. It pairs a waist-length liling dajin ao, an upper garment, with a long A-line qun that resembles a mamianqun. Flowers and birds are usually embroidered on it, read as a wish for love through every season. Its forerunner is a Qing dynasty wedding set made of a liling dajin changao and a mamianqun. The name is modern. It became popular in 2001, after the actress Zhou Xun played a character called Xiu He in the Chinese television drama Orange Turned Red, wearing a recreated Qing wedding aoqun. Viewers took the character's name for the dress.

The cheongsam

The cheongsam, also called zansae, qipao or the mandarin gown, began in the Qing dynasty as a dress for Manchu women. After the Qing fell in 1912 it grew popular in Hong Kong and Shanghai, and today it is worn as a wedding dress too. It did not start as Han Chinese wedding wear, so it sits apart from the Hanfu sets above. All the same, a bride may choose it, and the collective term for traditional Chinese wedding dress takes it in along with the fengguan xiapei, the qungua and the Xiuhefu.

How Traditional Chinese wedding dress is kept

Han Chinese people wear these sets when they marry. The bride may have a qungua that her mother began sewing at her birth and that arrived with her dowry, or she may wear a fengguan with an xiapei over a jacket and skirt, a gua with a qun, an Xiuhefu, or a cheongsam. After the wedding, the fengguan xiapei is set aside for formal occasions, worn over Chinese trousers or leggings instead of the skirt. Families choose among the styles; nothing ties the ceremony to one single garment.

When and where

The dress belongs to the marriage ceremony itself, not to a season. The sources give no calendar day or month for it. For the qungua, the work started long before: a mother sewed it from her daughter's birth, and the finished set passed to the bride with her dowry at the time of the wedding.

The sets come from China and belong to Han Chinese wedding practice. The cheongsam's rise in the early twentieth century is tied to Hong Kong and Shanghai, where it grew popular after 1912, and it is worn as wedding dress there and elsewhere. The other forms are not fixed to one city; the sources name no single home for them.

What Traditional Chinese wedding dress means

The fengguan xiapei carries a headdress and a stole, and its skirt is embroidered with dragons and phoenixes. Red appears in several of the sets: the mangao is red, and the mangchu may be red or green. On the Xiuhefu, flowers and birds are read as a wish for love that lasts through every season. The qungua's five grades say something too: the amount of embroidery a dress carries is what separates them. Married women keep the fengguan xiapei for formal days after the wedding.

Who takes part

• the bride: wears the chosen set of attire for the marriage ceremony
• the bride's mother: for the qungua, begins sewing the jacket and skirt when her daughter is born, and it goes with the dowry
• married women: wear the fengguan xiapei on formal occasions after their wedding, over trousers or leggings

Then and now

Two of the sets have changed in living memory. The qungua is now made commercially rather than by a mother's hand, though it remains a popular wedding dress. The Xiuhefu took its present name only in 2001, from a television drama. The cheongsam, once Manchu women's dress, is worn as wedding dress today. The fengguan xiapei belongs to the Ming and Qing dynasties.

On the wedding table

Symbols: The colour red Crowns and wreaths

Questions people ask about Traditional Chinese wedding dress

See also

XiuhefuA modern two-piece Chinese bridal outfit inspired by Qing dynasty styles and popularized by a 2001 television drama.Fengguan xiapeiThe traditional Han Chinese wedding ensemble of a phoenix crown and embroidered robes worn by brides in the Ming and QinBride priceWealth paid by the groom or his family to the bride or her kin to formalize a union.Marriage marketPublic spaces where families gather to find spouses for their children through listings and brokers.

Good reading and sources

• Traditional Chinese wedding dress on WikipediaEncyclopedia
• Wikidata recordOpen data

It may contain mistakes. Wedding customs differ from one family, village and community to the next, and the people who keep them know them best. If something is wrong, tell us. Last refreshed 2026-10-05.