Fishskin Dress of Hezhen Ethnic Group

The fishskin dress used to be the unique national clothing worn by the Hezhes. It speaks volumes for their strong will and high intelligence in utilizing natural resource, reforming natural conditions, adapting to the environment, and creating better life. To make fish skin clothes, first, the full skin of silver carp or chub is taken off and dried. Then, people remove the fish scales on the skin and hammer it with a wooden mallet to make the skin as soft as cotton cloth.

Afterwards, people sew the fishskin together with silver carp skin threads and make it into clothes. With the influence of the Manchu clothing, the fish skin dress is long garment, mainly for women. The clothing style of the Hezhes is close to cheongsam, with slim waist. The length of the dress is over the knees. It has loose and short sleeves but has no collar, only the collar-concave. The dress and trousers are fat, edged with colored cloth, embroidered with patterns, or it may be decorated with copper bells, and thus it seems to be bright and beautiful.

Fish skin trousers are made entirely different for males and females. Those for males are aligned at the upper ends, and the lower ends are edged with black cloth. In winter hunting, the trousers can resist cold weather and rough wearing. In spring and autumn fishing seasons, the trousers are water-resistant and can protect the knees.

However, with the improvement of living conditions, the material and design of the clothes of the Hezhe people have changed radically. Nowadays, the fishskin dress is no more the clothing the Hezhes used to wrap themselves in, but rather as a kind of folk handicrafts collected and ordered by museums, researchers of national culture, and tourists. Women with this kind of craft benefit a lot, too.