Qixi 2026: Key Takeaways
- Qixi has been dominated by campaign films this year
- Star power has played a large role
- As has a shift from traditional romance narratives
Qixi (China’s traditional Valentine’s Day) falls on the seventh day of the seventh lunar month. For 2026, that falls on August 19. Brands are already preparing. This year the campaign film is a popular way to get a message out, and there’s some solid viewing for anyone with the appetite to sit through them all. What’s interested us is the departure from traditional notions of romance.
Gucci put out a Qixi microdrama
Gucci’s Love Is a Drama (爱情有戏) is a three-part riff on China’s viral microdramas (catch the other two parts on thier Rednote, here). It packs in a cast of stars – Song Weilong (宋威龙), Wen Qi (文淇), Tian Xiwei (田曦薇) and Xiang Hanzhi (向涵之) – and the fast turns of fate that make the genre popular. But it’s also drawn criticism.
Viewers have complained online that the campaign is just jumping on a hot genre, and cheapening a high-status brand to do so. There were other status-competition complaints about how a character dresses in Gucci to impress a crush, but ignore them. This is high-status luxury. Let us know if you come across an online space where someone’s not being offended.
Loewe lets gestures do the talking
For Love Beyond Words (爱，在言语之外), Loewe gives brand ambassador Jiang Qiming (蒋奇明) three dialogue-free films inspired by mime. The films portray affection built through familiarity and self-acceptance rather than your traditional two-person romance narratives. The ultimate message is that love can be self-directed too.
Saint Laurent makes a case for the love letter
Saint Laurent’s Love Letters, Love Matters (纸短情长) pulls excerpts from letters by Bruce Lee (李小龙), sociologist Li Yinhe (李银河) and contemporary poet Hsu Peifen (徐珮芬) into its campaign film for Chinese cultural relevance.
It’s a very literary take, perhaps timed to coincide with China’s new aesthetics-of-intelligence trend, perhaps because it gives the fashion house a way to subvert the traditional Qixi narrative. Directed by Jeremy Z. Qin, the film is accompanied by an offline exhibition of photography by Lin Zhipeng (林志鹏) at the brand’s Beijing Rive Droite store.
Burberry finds romance in repeat listening
Where many other brands have gone in for the drama of love in their Qixi campaign films, Burberry’s Love, on Repeat (心动，无限循环) sends Zhang Jingyi (张婧仪) on a small-scale romantic journey.
Zhang Kangle (张康乐) plays the romantic counterpart in a story that puts everyday chemistry at its narrative core and sets its story around a meeting in a record store.
Chaumet makes a proposal a mutual act
Chaumet’s We Crown Each Other turns a familiar proposal scene on its head. On a riverside staircase, Wen Qi (文淇) and her partner play rock-paper-scissors while each secretly carries a ring box.
When he prepares to kneel, she steps down to meet him, revealing her own proposal. Directed by Zhou Jinghao (周璟豪) and shot by Chengma Zhiyuan (程马志远), the film updates the Joséphine collection’s coronation motif into a story of equality and choice.
What’s notable here is the level of craft Chaumet have gone in for. Chengma is a case in point. Sino/cinephiles, if you haven’t seen his cinematography in Only the River Flows (2023), go catch up.
The Beast turns an unopened flower into a fragrance story
Being ambassador for so many brands, Wen Qi (文淇) has been featured in something like three or four Qixi campaigns. The Beast (野兽派)’s Flowers Are Wordless Love Letters (花，是无字的情书) has her play a plant photographer who receives a blank letter and an unopened epiphyllum bud. The brand’s Qixi fragrance makes the message visible.
To generate an extra layer of hype, The Beast also handed its social media accounts over to Wen Qi for three days. She spent the time uploading plant and love-themed content in a crossover that gave the film a very real-life grounding.
The Dao View: Qixi 2026 is about star power for stand-out appeal
Brands need content that can do the rounds on social media but that content can’t feel interchangeable with the rest of what people see on their feeds. You’ll notice the number of stars being called up for Qixi 2026 campaign season. No doubt their appeal will help these seven brands stand out.
And standing out is what the narrative shift here is all about too. Broadening the meaning of love beyond man gives woman gift means brand messages appeal to a broader audience. Single consumers, women buying for themselves, and couples who want a more credible expression of intimacy are all included. It gives a seasonal sales moment a broader cultural relevance and gives consumers more reasons to see themselves in the story.
