In early years of the Qing Dynasty, the "moonlight skirt" was once very popular, which was made by ten pieces of cloth that was tucked into tens of pleats. Each pleat was in a different color and painted carefully. The color was light and elegant, like bright moon light. There was another type called the "Chinese ink painting skirt," which used cloth with simple but elegant background color. The cloth was then printed with pattern of scattered flowers. The skirt had the charm of the Chinese ink painting and looked very elegant. During the reign of Kangxi and Qianlong, the “phoenix tail skirt" prevailed. The outside of underskirt was decorated with narrow long ribbons made by all different colors of silk and satin. Each strip of ribbon was embroidered with different patterns, and both edges were decorated with golden threads or laces. The skirt looked very fancy and luxurious. Since the middle period of the Qing Dynasty, people had exerted more creativity on the skirt design based on the previous skirt fashion. They tucked the cloth into very thin pleats. From the material object we could see today, there was one skirt with more than three hundred pleats. The skirt hem was embroidered with water pattern. The water pattern would be partly hidden and partly visible when its wearer started to walk, which made the skirt look very dazzling. Later, pleats were joined with silk threads, so that they could be tightened and loosened flexibly. The skirt looked like fish scale, so it was called the "fish scale pleated skirt." At the end of the Qing, there appeared skirts that were decorated with ribbons. The ribbon was cut into the shape of a sword, and its sharp corner was decorated with gold, silver and bronze bells. The skirt not only looked very fancy and dazzling, but also would make euphonious tinkle sound when its wearer walked around.
In those years, there was a kind of beautiful ornament for lady garments. The ornament was put on shoulder parts, and the four corners in front, back and two shoulders were all made in the shape of cloud. As it was very similar to the Chinese lucky sign - ruyi, this type of ornament was called the "cloud shoulder." There were layers of tassels hung from the edges on this ornament. First appeared in the Tang Dynasty, but became popular in the Qing Dynasty, this type of ornaments was an indispensable part of wedding and ceremonial costumes.
In middle and later years of the Qing Dynasty, there was no big difference between Manchu and Hah women's daily clothes. Their common features were loose-bodied robes covering outside the standard Chinese slim and weak beautiful ladies with slopping shoulders, wasp waist, and flat chest. No bizarre dresses were allowed at that time.
