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China: Mao Zedong, wearing his trademark 'Mao suit', announces the establishment of the People's Republic of China at Tiananmen Square, Beijing, on October 1, 1949

China: Mao Zedong, wearing his trademark 'Mao suit', announces the establishment of the People's Republic of China at Tiananmen Square, Beijing, on October 1, 1949

The modern Chinese tunic suit is a style of male attire known in China as the Zhongshan suit (simplified Chinese: 中山装; traditional Chinese: 中山裝; pinyin: Zhōngshān zhuāng) (after Sun Yat-Sen), also known in the West as the Mao suit (after Mao Zedong). Sun Yat-sen introduced the style shortly after the founding of the Republic of China as a form of national dress although with a distinctly political and later governmental implication.

After the end of the Chinese Civil War and the establishment of the People's Republic of China in 1949, the suit became widely worn by males and government leaders as a symbol of proletarian unity and an Eastern counterpart to the Western business suit. The name 'Mao suit' comes from Chinese leader Mao Zedong's affinity for wearing them in public, thus tying the garment closely to him and Chinese communism in general in the Western imagination. Although they fell into disuse among the general public in the 1990s due to increasing Western influences, they are commonly worn by Chinese leaders during important state ceremonies and functions.

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