Couple says 'I do' to tradition

Chris Chuang was not Claudia Lam's first choice as the perfect date for her sorority formal. But with her top pick unavailable that night, she figured the friendly guy from her Chinese class would do.

"I wanted someone good-looking and nice as an escort," said Claudia, noting that she had one other qualification that Chris also met: no frat guys.

To say that Chris was excited is an understatement. The two attended UC Davis, and he first noticed Claudia in 2007 in an advanced Chinese class (neither of them really needed it), and the entire quarter passed without him summoning the courage to talk to her.

"I didn't think I'd have a chance," he said. "She wore her sorority letters, so you'd assume that she hangs out with lots of eligible dudes."

The next quarter, they were assigned to a project together, and he realized she wasn't that intimidating after all.

While they attended Claudia's formal as acquaintances, by the end of the night, they were well on their way to falling in love.

"We had a chemistry I had never felt before," Chris said. "With other girls I always had to put in a lot of effort, thinking about what we're going to do next or talk about next. But everything felt so natural that by the end of that night, I felt I had known her for a long time. I just knew."

Claudia said she felt similarly, and she was further convinced when she brought him to her sorority; how quickly her sisters took to him was a true test.

"He got along with everyone so well," she said. "He's one of those people that everyone likes right away."

Chris, 30, grew up in Fremont, the son of immigrants from Taiwan. He is head of business development at a startup called MixRank. Claudia, also 30, grew up in Hong Kong but came to live with relatives to attend high school in Moraga, and then stayed to attend UC Davis. After graduating in 2009, she felt it was time to return home, and the couple faced the prospect of a long-distance relationship. They weathered the distance for one year, meeting up at a family wedding or other occasions, until Chris got a job in Beijing. That meant they were only four hours apart instead of 12. Finally, after almost two years of commuting by plane, they decided they would make their home in San Francisco and moved in together. Claudia is a human resources manager for Dome Cleaning.

"Claudia is the only person who really gets me," Chris said. "Even when we were apart for two years, we were still together."

In November 2015, they attended the wedding of Claudia's sister in Bali. There, Chris told Claudia's father that he intended to propose the following week.

He made good on his promise, getting a friend to document her surprise as she found him on bended knee on the roof of their condo complex at sunset.

They married on Nov. 5, 2016, at the Asian Art Museum in San Francisco.

While it is common for couples of Chinese heritage to incorporate a Chinese tea ceremony, that was not enough for this pair.

"Somehow I came up with the idea that we should have an ancient imperial Chinese wedding," said Chris, who admits he got much more involved with the planning than most grooms.

They wed on the stairs of the museum looking like any American couple — but their reception was a different story. They entered the reception in red satin Hanfu outfits with gold brocade — a dragon for him, a phoenix for her — that they had custom-made in China; the style is the historical dress of the Han Chinese (although Claudia went through five wardrobe changes throughout the evening). Meanwhile, the wedding party donned outfits of bright yellow; the groomsmen held banners with their names in Chinese as they entered and the bridesmaids carried red lanterns.

Paintings by Chris' uncle, a fine arts painter in Taiwan now deceased, decorated the cocktail hour, and wedding favors were an ancient three-pronged shot glass from the Shang dynasty. Rather than flowers, a 3-D puzzle replica of an ancient Chinese building decorated each table.

Later, guests were treated to a performance by the China Dance Theatre, a Richmond District organization that teaches traditional Chinese dance to young girls. The group doesn't usually do private events but agreed to perform at the wedding because of its unique nature.

While some in the wedding party initially balked at the costumes they had to don for the reception, saying, "Do we really have to wear this?" the end result was worth it.

"Everyone thought it was really cool," Claudia said.

Apparently, the museum agreed. Their wedding was featured on its blog, and it was covered in ChinaDaily.com.

"They definitely took a much deeper dive into history than most couples do," said Minda Quickel, facility rental program manager of the Asian Art Museum. "We have lots of weddings that celebrate a particular culture, but Chris and Claudia were dynasty-specific, going back more than a thousand years, which was very original."

Digital technology brings Palace Museum back to life

As one of the first museums in the world to display its whole collections online, the Palace Museum of China spent three years in building its digital community.

It has now realized a variety of functions such as public education, cultural presentation, virtual tour, entertainment, academic exchange and e-commerce.

In recent years, the museum has launched nine APPs in total, winning a high praise from the media -- APPs by the Palace Museum are of best quality”.

With the Night Revels of Han Xizai APP, users are welcomed to explore the famous Chinese painting of the same title that vividly depicts the luxurious court life during the Five Dynasty period (906--960AD).

The APP offers insightful explanations on the painting's history, main characters and artistic skills.

What's more, the music and dance performances recorded in the APP bring the painting back to life, giving users a rare chance to appreciate ancient performance art.

From the Qing Emperor's Wardrobe APP, users will understand the difference between imperial dress of Qing dynasty(1644-1911AD) and the costumes in the current popular TV dramas.

Users can also learn about the function, ritual use and symbolism behind the imperial dress and accessories.

The Palace Museum Exhibitions APP allows users to experience the museum's past and current exhibitions through their phones.

The Palace Museum plans to spend another three years in building an intelligent museum with stronger security system and communicating ability.

With new technology and advanced equipment, the museum has developed a digital museum consisting of original projects that dig deep into the data of collections and ancient architecture.

A good example is the Digital Map of the museum, which contains information regarding its 1,200 buildings and 9,371 rooms.

Another project is Digital Calligraphy where users have the chance to practice after the example of the 7,500 masterpieces treasured in the museum, and receive feedbacks such as "brilliant" or "horrible".

With Digital Handscrolls where valuable scroll paintings are exhibited, viewers can get a closer look at many works of art that are too fragile to display.

The Digital Treasury program presents users with a diverse selection of magnificent Chinese cultural heritage in 3D models.

Thanks to virtual reality technology, viewers can get a glimpse of the rooms that are not yet open to the public, such as the Hall of Supreme Harmony and Sanxitang (the Room of Three Rare Treasures).

At the core of building Intelligent Palace is the program of World Cultural Heritage Monitoring. There are 3,500 high definition cameras in use to monitor the museum.

However, the concealed spaces above the ceiling or underneath the roof tiles are still waiting to be monitored.

The Palace Museum is determined to upgrade itself in the digital era to offer the world an easily accessed goldmine of cultural treasures.

New Chinese costume drama becomes internet sensation

Among the dynasties in China's 5,000 years of history, the Three Kingdoms, Wei, Shu and Wu dynasties (220-280) were periods that have always attracted a lot of attention.

The historical book The Records of the Three Kingdoms (San Guo Zhi) from the Western Jin Dynasty (265-316) recorded the era. Later Luo Guanzhong from the Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368) wrote a fiction Romance of the Three Kingdoms (San Guo Yan Yi) based on history, which later became one of the four great classical novels of Chinese literature.

In modern times, the stories during this period have been adapted into many operas, films, TV series, comics, computer games and even a popular card game called Legend of the Three Kingdoms (San Guo Sha).

Heroes from that period such as warlord Cao Cao and his two sons Cao Zhi and Cao Pi, as well as Zhuge Liang, Zhang Fei, Guan Yu and Liu Bei are all well-known characters in China.

Recently, a new internet costume drama The Advisor Alliance based on these characters became a hit. Produced by online video platform Youku, the two-part series was broadcast on the internet, Jiangsu TV and Anhui TV from June 22.

The drama unfolds around Sima Yi, a military counselor who helped Cao Cao and his two sons during the fights among the three kingdoms.

Currently, the first part has received 4 billion hits on Youku and 8.3 points out of 10 on Douban, China's major film and TV review website. A mobile game adapted from the drama.

Called by internet users as a Chinese version of House of Cards, the drama was highly praised for its exciting stories and film style.

Han Zhong, art designer of the series, said most of the money was spent on the sets. They used more than 6,000 costumes and took 20,000 hours to complete the props.

The elaborate drama attracted audiences from all ages.

According to guduomedia.com, an internet media data website, 33 per cent of the series' viewers are people aged from 20-29 and 50 per cent are 30-39 years old.

"The drama beautifully featured many details in history. The acting skills of actors and actresses also highlight the series," 22-year-old student Li Tao from Beijing Institute of Technology said. "The casting is not ideal, though. Some of the actors lack the charisma of the historical figures that they played. For example, actor Li Chen looks too soft for the role Cao Pi."

The drama was also criticised for not faithfully portraying history. The series infused many small events that happened at different points in history, yet featured them in the same period.

And the actors' lines sounded slightly too modern for the roles. For instance "the medicine should not be stopped", a popular saying in recent years, was said in the drama. The original meaning of the saying is: "you are ignorant, please have something to make you clever", and many audiences said the use of it spoiled the mood in the drama.

Unlike young people who cared more about the plot and set design, the older audiences paid more attention to what they could learn from the drama.

"I learned some ways to deal with things from the drama. Whether you are a high-profile person or a low-key fellow, you must be knowledgeable if you really want to succeed," 58-year-old viewer Daheqidan said.

Celebrating 70 Years of Christian Dior

On Monday night, on one of those spectacular Paris summer evenings when the light shimmers off every surface and the sun doesn't set until around 10, hundreds of fashionably dressed people gathered in the garden of the Musée des Art Décoratifs, enjoying Champagne and hors d'oeuvres as a newly shorn and platinum blond Cara Delevingne looked on from above, standing in the open French doors of a second-floor reception room.

Although the guests (who included the actor Robert Pattinson and the model Bella Hadid) mingled among topiary versions of now-classic fashion designs, few people seemed to actually make it inside to the exhibition itself: "Christian Dior: Couturier du Rêve," a retrospective of 70 years of the house of Dior.

And that's too bad, because the show is a stunner.

Billed as the largest fashion exhibition ever staged by the museum, the show, which officially opens on Wednesday and runs through Jan. 7, features more than 300 haute couture gowns from the seven designers who led this fashion house, from Christian Dior himself to Maria Grazia Chiuri, who presented her second couture collection earlier on Monday.

Each of the designers who followed Dior and who preceded Ms. Chiuri have their own exhibition rooms: Yves Saint Laurent, Marc Bohan, Gianfranco Ferré, John Galliano and Raf Simons. And each grouping offers a bit of revelation, from the awe-inspiring Trapeze collection by Saint Laurent, done when he was just 21 years old, to the way that Mr. Simon both honored and modernized the classic Dior look when he showed his first collection in 2012.

But perhaps the biggest surprise is the reverence given to the Galliano years. The House of Dior has had a understandably complicated relationship with the Galliano era ever since the designer was fired in 2011 after making drunken anti-Semitic comments in a Paris bistro. But here the genius of his work — there is no other word for it — is given its due, and one is again reminded how the Galliano Dior shows were typically the most anticipated of couture week.

But it all comes back to Dior himself. And his designs, placed strategically throughout the show, are a reminder of what a revolutionary figure he was in the fashion world and how the Bar Jacket — which holds a place of pride at the exhibition's entrance — remains both an inspiration and a challenge to all who have come after him.