Home-grown Chinese design brands will soon be selling affordable products in the west, according to Italian designer Luca Nichetto, who is creative director of Chinese startup furniture brand ZaoZuo (+ slideshow).
Nichetto said that local brands are growing in confidence and sophistication and are learning how to produce high-quality, low-cost products at incredible speed.
Luca Nichetto was announced as creative director of Chinese furniture brand ZaoZuo during Beijing Design Week 2015
"There are a lot of brands that are growing," Nichetto said, adding that they could soon be exporting western-style products to the west.
"With ZaoZuo for example, one of their plans is to first go into the US market and later on move to the European market," he said. Nichetto has designed a new furniture range for Chinese startup ZaoZuo, which includes a collection of chairs called Silk that are inspired by the Silk Road
Nichetto said that Chinese brands聽Stellar Works and Neri & Hu were already exporting to Europe and the USA, but clich茅d western ideas about China meant "we don't know too much about what is going on there".
The growing Chinese urban middle class, together with the increasing numbers of young, western-educated Chinese returning to the country, is creating demand for a western lifestyle, Nichetto said.

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