Wei Nian
Two days later, after seeing May and Aunt Mei off, Zhiwei finally felt that the wedding was over. She felt that there wasn't much difference between before and after the wedding, except that they had moved from Yayuan to Rongdi. However, their schedules were different, so even though she had moved, she still spent most of her time in her suite downstairs. She had previously combined the downstairs guest room with Li Fuqiang's study.
When Li Fuqiang works from home, he uses the study downstairs. Zhiwei either reads in the study or exercises in front of the open-plan floor-to-ceiling window. She usually does stretching yoga and doesn't do much strength training. When Li Fuqiang looks up at that graceful figure during breaks from work, even without saying a word, he finds her beauty captivating and can quite appreciate the pleasure of having a beautiful woman by his side, a pleasure that evokes the ancient Chinese saying "a beautiful woman adds fragrance to one's life."
Xiaoyu followed Zhiwei back to Rongdi. However, Sister Shen did not assign her any household chores. Her daily tasks included taking care of Zhiwei's clothes and washing her underwear, regularly cleaning Yayuan Garden, and acting as Zhiwei's assistant, helping her coordinate travel needs with Li Fuqiang's assistant or dealing with the staff of Zhiwei's companies.
Xiaoyu doesn't know anything about doing business. Her strength is that she remembers everything Zhiwei asks of her and completes it perfectly.
Recently, Zhiwei has been focusing all her energy on her brand, Wei Nian. The company and brand were registered long ago, but apart from designing clothing styles in her spare time, there hasn't been much progress. It was also suspended for almost a month due to the wedding, and it has only now restarted.
She had previously looked for two or three experienced tailors, but now that the wedding was over, she finally had the energy to continue. Her interview was also very simple. She selected three designs from her own collection, one for each person, and asked them to make two pieces each for her and Jingnan: a suit dress and a skirt-style coat.
Jingnan sighed, "Ever since I met Zhiwei, she's practically taken over my entire wardrobe."
Regardless of the interview outcome, she paid the full amount for the custom-made items, and the fabrics were all high-end materials she provided. While others used supplementary credit cards to buy designer clothes and bags, she went and bought a whole bunch of fabrics, even though the prices were equally staggering.
She didn't rent a shop outside for the time being, and used Ya Yuan as her studio for the time being. She only kept her own bedroom, and cleared out the things in the other two bedrooms to store the studio's equipment.
The fabrics were displayed in one of the rooms, and each tailor had her own time to cut the fabric according to her design and the measurements she took.
The three master tailors' skills were undoubtedly superb. However, one tailor, perhaps due to an old habit, would unconsciously leave an extra two inches of allowance when making clothes, even though the measurements were very accurate. This was probably because he didn't make many clothes before and needed to prepare for wearing different thicknesses of clothing underneath.
The other tailor's measurements were tight, but she was used to being frugal. Just by touching the fabric, you could tell it was expensive, so she cut it diagonally in many places to save material. Since the fabric was a plain, unpatterned cashmere, cutting it any way wouldn't affect the finished product's shape. Sure enough, she used the least material of the three.
The last master tailor's workmanship was also very meticulous, and the measurements were accurate, leaving only a slight half-inch allowance. However, she used the most material for her cuts. Moreover, her lining was made of the finest champagne-colored silk fabric that Zhiwei kept in her studio.
When Zhiwei saw her finished product, she nodded and said, "Using silk as the lining is indeed exquisite, but the shrinkage rate of silk is different from that of cashmere. It looks neat now, but I'm afraid that after washing, the lining will be too short and uneven."
The master tailor's name is Wang Zhijun. She used to work in a long-established state-owned clothing factory. Later, the factory closed down, and she became a seamstress in a suit shop. Everyone usually calls her Sister Wang.
After listening to Zhiwei's words, Sister Wang nodded and said, "That's true. However, clothes made with such high-end fabric can only be dry cleaned. The first time, I cut off ten centimeters and dry cleaned it at home. When I was actually cutting it, I first estimated the approximate length in meters, then cut off the whole piece of fabric, sent it to the shop for dry cleaning, and then cut the fabric again. In the end, I had about twenty centimeters left over."
After hearing her words, Zhiwei asked her directly, "Ms. Wang, would you be willing to join my clothing brand and work together to make Wei Nian's brand famous?"
Zhiwei offered very generous terms, giving her a base salary of 20,000 yuan, which is 50% higher than her current monthly income. In addition, she will receive 10% of the profits from the sale of the dresses she completes.
Without any hesitation, Sister Wang accepted the job, after all, she also wanted to be called Ms. Wang rather than Sister Wang.
When Jingnan handed the formal employment contract to Zhijun, she saw that all the terms Zhiwei had mentioned were clearly listed in the contract, which naturally made her feel more at ease.
After the contract was signed, Zhiwei asked her to see if there were any other staff members needed.
Zhijun said, "Since we're just starting out, we don't need to expand the business too much. I think we can just hire another mid-level tailor to help out. Also, I think the young lady's goal is high-end clothing brands, so we'll probably need to hire another skilled craftswoman to handle embroidery, rhinestones, and beadwork. But such people are hard to find."
Zhiwei nodded; it was similar to what she had thought. She would let Zhijun recruit the assistant craftsmen herself. The craftsmen were more important, so the two of them would work together to find them, and if they found suitable candidates, they would then screen them together.
Although business wasn't booming yet, Zhiwei wasn't idle. She asked Zhijun to make two outfits for Xu Anyi, Aunt Mei, and Shen Ping, each based on designs they had chosen from her collection. Only then did Aunt Mei realize that the reason she, a bride-to-be, had taken her measurements two days before the wedding was for this very reason.
She and Xu Anyi had previously visited Zhiwei's gift shop and picked out a few decorative items designed by Zhiwei herself, planning to promote her online store later. Unexpectedly, the little girl from back then not only runs a successful gift shop, but is also busy planning her own clothing brand.
Putting everything else aside, she was just relieved for her friend. After all, even though she herself was childless by choice, she knew that what mothers worry about most is their children.
When Shen Ping saw that her mistress wanted her brand to customize clothes for her, she wanted to decline, but she was afraid that her mistress was trying to win people over. If she declined, she was worried that her mistress would think she was being pretentious, so she could only humbly say, "I don't know anything about these things, so Madam, you can decide for me."
Zhiwei had no idea that she had thought of so many things. She actually picked out a simple and elegant two-piece suit that could be worn for everyday life and formal occasions, plus a mid-sleeve dress for spring and summer.
By the time these six outfits were finished, another month had passed. For each completed garment, Zhiwei would take detailed photos, which, along with the design sketches, served as documentation. At this point, she couldn't help but sigh, wondering if it was because she had planned ahead, but the photography credits she had earned, while not enough to produce masterpieces, were certainly sufficient for photographing product catalogs.
Xu Jiayi, Shen Ping, and Jing Nan even served as her models. Zhiwei specially bought several masquerade handheld masks to prevent them from revealing their true faces. This unintentional idea later became a unique design element in Wei Nian's product images.
Furthermore, her product images also include detailed 3D information about the models. From then on, not using models with perfect figures became a typical characteristic of Wei Nian's product catalogs.
After all, while models with perfect figures look good in clothes, it doesn't guarantee that ordinary people like us will have such a figure. Good clothing design should highlight the unique temperament of its wearer, rather than expose any flaws in their physique.
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