the sandy liang girl grows up
two years ago I would have been frothing with sample sale fomo
Sandy Liang was the first fashion brand I felt a genuine personal connection with. After two obsessive years of collecting pieces and often posting head-to-toe Sandy outfits on Instagram, I find myself no longer identifying quite as strongly with the brand.
What’s changed?
Let’s go back to 2019. Her fleeces starting getting press. Worn by the likes of Greta Lee and LCD founder Geraldine Chung, wearing Sandy Liang was a way of signaling that you were a creative Asian-American. There was a cultural specificity to it. It meant you watched Youngmi Mayer TikToks, mourned the closure of Opening Ceremony and always made a stop for Pine & Crane if you were in LA.
As the Sandy Liang brand grew, my sense of pride stemmed from feeling seen as an Chinese-American (and more specifically, Cantonese). It was easy to slip into a parasocial relationship with Sandy herself.