Mamianqun

Ma Mian Qun, also known as "Ma Mian Zhe Qun", is one of the main skirt styles for ancient oriental women. There are four skirt doors at the front, back and outside, two of which overlap.

The outer skirt door is decorated, and the inner skirt door has less or no decoration. , Ma Mian Qun is pleated on the sides, and the waist of the skirt is mostly made of white cloth, which means growing old together, and is tied with ropes or buttons.

Etymology

The term Ma Mian Qun is composed of three Chinese characters: Ma, which literally means "horse" ; Mian, which literally means "face"; and Qun, which literally means "skirt".

In some 19th century French publications, the Ma Mian Qun were sometimes described as "deux jupes plissés" (transl. two pleated skirts).The name Paired apron has sometimes been used in English literature to refer to the mamianqun due to its construction of using two overlapping panels of fabric tied to a single waistband forming a single wrap skirt which is tied around the waist,like an apron. The term Paired apron was coined by John Vollmer in the second half of the 20th century and can be found as early as the 1980s.

Main characteristics

The mamianqun is composed of two overlapping panel of fabrics which wrapped around the lower body.Each of these two panels were identical and formed half of the skirt, which were then sewn together a single waistband creating the overlapping front.A mamianqun is a total of four flat and straight panels are known as qunmen (裙门; 'skirt door') or mamian (马面裙; 'horse face');there are two flat panels at the right and left side of each panel of fabric. When worn, only two out of the four flat panels are visible on the wearer's body; the visible panels are seen located at the front and back of the skirt; The mamianqun were typically tied with ties which extended beyond the skirt's width at the waistband.

Pleats, gores, and trims

The historical mamianqun is typically decorated with pleated side panels, gores,which can also vary in styles and types.The use pleats, gores, and sometimes on the left side of the skirt allowed greater ease of movements when walking, allowing Chinese women to swing gracefully as they walked.The trims which decorated mamianqun of the Qing dynasty did not only impacted the overall appearance of the skirt, but also influenced the way it would move as the wearer takes walk.For example, depending on how the each trims were sewed to the edge of the pleats, the pleats may move independently from each other or create "ripple effects".

Types of pleats

Types of pleats used in the historical mamianqun: narrow pleats in honeycomb pattern or in fish-scale pattern,knife pleats; and box pleat.

The pleats could also be a combination of knife pleats which radiate outwards to the left and right of a central box pleat located at the middle region of side hips.These types of pleats used in the mamianqun contrasted from the pleats used in the wide skirt of Western ladies as described by Samuel Wells William in 1849.

Nowadays

Daily outings, gatherings with friends and commuting to work are the current mainstream wearing scenarios of horse-faced skirts, accounting for nearly 30% of the total. This shows that horse-faced skirts have gradually become the main choice of clothing for young people.
The well-known luxury brand Dior once borrowed the design of the horse-face skirt and launched a product similar to the horse-face skirt in the autumn of 2022.