Costumes are hot mess mix of differents decades and all of them are of western origins (I hated Xu Kai’s velvet suit paired with embroidered cowboy shoes with burning passion), if you look up photos from that era most people outside of big cities wear mostly Chinese clothes, modernized qipao started at around that times, not that people didn’t wear Western fashion of course. And the way society is presented, there is no way in hell that upper class unmarried young woman would be allowed to work (at night! while attending school) and at a seedy bar to that, not to mention Manting career as cabaret singer and actress. And Xie Xiang parents would let her go alone to school hours away from them without checking and paying tuition for school first. But of course it probably wouldn’t be so entertaining or maybe it would, who knows.

I thought so, thanks @shach. The leather trousers, cowboy boots and sunglasses looked out of place for 1914. On the other hand, I do like the Art Deco decorations and the ladies’ long flowing dresses.

That’s why I said it reminds me of Ghibli movies or The Adventures of Tin Tin, broadly set in a pre-WWI China that looks a lot like Europe. I don’t care though, the drama has enough to keep me entertained. 😀

I like their lunch “boxes”/canteens, however they call it. I like how the cover can be used as a plate!

Thanks shach. As history is my weakest point and I stay away from period dramas, these details and logic are overlooked by me. But yes I do agree that his cowboy boots were out of place and women in this drama are seen as more carefree (have more freedom to rule and to do what they want) than what they would have been back in those days.