Rising Stars: Meet Yuchen Han

Today we’d like to introduce you to Yuchen Han. They and their team shared their story with us below:

Background story Past:
Childhood domestic violence experience has left Yuchen Han with an unforgettable memory. Though he escaped from his father’s violence back to his loving mother when he was 12, self-abasement was so deep that he never got rid of it. However, inspired by Lady Gaga’s music and fashion, he got his confidence back and found his passion in fashion. After ten years of interest exploration and two years of professional training, he entered the Fashion Design program at the China Academy of Art as the No.1 pick of Qinghai Province. He established a brand with his name, Yuchen Han, in 2014 with his soaring impetus and released two series then. In 2017, Yuchen when to the Fashion Design MFA program at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York with his dream and first investment from his mother. Cultural shock, intense school work, and recall of childhood memories have brought him severe depression, and he had hit the lowest point in his life. Nevertheless, in 2019, he founded AlienAnt, a brand that reflects all his emotions, stories, pains, and dreams. He hopes to show those who share the same feelings through fashion that they have the power to turn their trauma into triumph. After launching its first collection in 2020, the brand gained widespread attention from the international media, fashion, and entertainment industries. But the COVID-19 pandemic immediately erased all the brand’s voices a month later. After that, he decided to suspend the brand and started two-year self-improvement under the continuous attack of the pandemic, depression, and financial and identity pressures.

Present:
Yuchen’s depression has been gone with the coming back of the world’s order in early 2022. As soon as he brought back his brand, he won the Yu Prize – the most influential award for fashion designers after a four-month-long competition with 20 of the most famous designers in China. Reviewers from all around the world recognized his work. After then, supported by Yu Prize, OTB, LiNing, and UGG, Yuchen built a team with 33 people to rerun his brand. ALIENANT released their collaboration collection with LINING on Sep 20, 2022, released their collaboration with UGG on April 2, 2023, and released their first RTW collection on April 28th.

Future:
Facing the future, ALIENANT wishes to pioneer and lead the first High-end RTW fashion brand that combines psychological value and the beauty of imperfection. The two-year goal is to complete the commercialization and look forward to a five-year plan of having the same commercial size and recognition as Marine Serre, Y/Project, Feng Chen Wang. The brand will always take its original intention to empower more AlienAntors to become better selves through fashion.

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
Creative Director:
Yuchen Han is a fashion designer who focuses on the connections between personal and social emotions. He founded his high-end RTW fashion brand ALIENANT in New York in 2019.

At the very beginning of his career, he has already invented a signature technique plus a very recognizable look; he maximum the power of combining technology, storytelling, and personal narratives. He is bringing cultural identities into the modern tech-driven world. His autobiographical fashion collection has built a brand new, individually attached, and socially affected aesthetic system.

His boundless creativity has drawn great attention from the fashion industry; his works are featured in Vogue, Bazaar, Nylon, Tatler, etc.; His design was also worn and loved by celebrities like Coldplay, Halsey, and Billy Porter.

Honor:
1, YU PRIZE Rising Voices Award 2022- in partnership with UGG
2, YINGER PRIZE 2022-Collaboration Designer Grand Prize Winner
3, Top 30 Under 30 of AACYF 2023
4, Rise Up Sustainable fashion finalists 2022
5, YU PRIZE 2022 finalists
6, The KOL and brand ambassador of Faber-Castell 2022
7, Netflix Next in fashion casting designer
8, New Order of Fashion Finalists 2020
9, iD X Artsthresd X Gucci global design graduates 2020 finalists
10, Project Runway Season 20 casting finalists
11, Not Just A Label X Swatch On award finalists/Top 20 of 2020
12, Gucci Fellowship 2019 finalists
13, Lane Crawford Creative calls out prize 2017 finalists

ALIENANT:
ALIENANT is a high-end ready-to-wear fashion brand founded in New York in 2019. The brand story originated from the founder’s dreamland that lasted for six years: trapped in the white mist, a tiny alien ant crawling with a grain of moun- tain-big rice on its back.

AlienAnt focuses on men’s and women’s clothing, bags, and accessories. The brand’s unique aesthetic system is fully interpreted through its signature “glitch ” design genes and “wearable defense mechanism” design concept. For more information, please visit https://www.alienantofficial.com.

Would you say it has been a smooth road, and if not, what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
I would definitely say it has not been a smooth road. The two biggest challenges I’ve faced are my depression and lack of business funding. I have been studying and working for almost a decade to achieve the dream of launching my own label, but depression took away all my motivation and desire. I struggled so much to even feel alive. Another challenge is the funding for my start-up business. Since I’m self-funding it from myself and my family, I also rely on funding from winning prizes to keep the business going.

What do you like best about our city? What do you like least?
I like the chill vibe of LA. There is no other place that makes me feel like this – palm trees, the orange-purple color of the sky. I’m just so obsessed with the energy of the city! However, I dislike the traffic here, like most people.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.alienantofficial.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/alienant_official/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/88892949/admin/feed/posts/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@alienant1994