On 29 July, Chinese menswear brand Lilanz (利郎) released a promotional video, co-created with the Chinese National Geography magazine. As part of the “Follow the Silk Road to Paris” project by Chinese National Geography, the video shows guests visiting locations on the ancient Silk Road in Lilanz suits.
The guests, dubbed an “intellectual idol group” (智性男团), include athletes Zhong Man, Bao Chunlai and Qi Guangpu, chief editor of Chinese National Geography Li Shuangke, Greenpeace ambassador for Antarctica and former reality TV star Wang Yuheng, actor Gao Zhiting, popular science influencer Zhang Chenliang, weather presenter Feng Shu and travel influencer Captain Han. It took 3 months for the guests to travel across 13 cities in 7 countries from the Hexi corridor in Western China to Paris via Central Asian countries, Turkey, Greece and Italy. The men, sharply dressed in dark suits walk through deserts and across mountains before reaching towns and cities.
On Weibo, China’s Twitter-like platform, the Lilanz topic “dress to impress” (#盛装奔赴盛会#) garnered 44.42 million views, more than twice that of Chinese National Geography magazine’s official “Follow the Silk Road to Paris” (#沿着丝路到巴黎#) tag, which has 20.27 million views. The magazine released a documentary short series detailing each stop of the trip and the interaction between the men in the “idol group”. The magazine is also hosting an exhibition between 27 July and 10 September at the Anta Arena store in Shenyang, Liaoning.
Lilanz has been growing continuously in recent years as the company revenue increased 14.8% year-on-year (YoY) in 2023 to 3.54 billion RMB (490.88 million USD) and its profit surged 18.4% to 530 million RMB (73.41 million USD). It’s been in a rebrand cycle since August 2023, aiming towards a younger audience, so the latest “intellectual” and cultural collaboration certainly feeds into that effort.
