August 13, 2025 |
Li Gong’s creations are less about the present moment and more about weaving narratives of the past and future into fabric, making him something of a sartorial time traveller. From Paris Fashion Week to the dust-drenched dunes of Western China, his Shanghai-based label 8ON8, launched in 2017, spins retro-futuristic daydreams into edgy tailored reality. “Time is a continuous thread,” Gong says. “Past, present and future exist simultaneously.” It’s not just a philosophy, it’s his modus operandi.
A graduate of Central Saint Martins, Gong has spent the last eight years honing a visual language that fuses sport with surrealism. 8ON8 – its name born from a serendipitous Photoshop accident morphing his surname into the brand’s current name – is where Grecian drapes coexist with suits created in Japanese recycled wools and up-cycled tech fabrics. The masculinity here? “Not a fixed aesthetic, but an energy that radiates from within,” he says, an ethos born from embracing “life’s beautiful absurdities with quiet confidence.” He creates retro futuristic pieces through nostalgic visions of the future with a modern take, perfectly capturing this spirit by blending sleek, vintage-inspired aesthetics with edgy and sustainable materials.
SS20
So, where do all these nostalgic futuristic ideas spring from? From a romantic expression of the past, stitched perfectly into his vision of a future cosmopolitan lifestyle. Gong treats the present as a bridge, capturing fragments of daily life from an emerging global middle class and reassembling them into futuristic urban lifestyles. It’s an aesthetic that finds the beauty in where memory and modernity collide. By blending contemporary sporty elements with highly saturated retro colour palettes in their menswear, 8ON8 strikes the perfect balance between creativity and functionality from an urban lens.
His design mantra, “form follows function”, has guided him since his student days. For Gong, precision in cut and proportion isn’t an afterthought; it’s the “launchpad for all creativity.” He finds life in recalibrating clothing details, “not enough to shock but enough to make the eye linger – that’s where the magic happens.” It’s in that harmonious balance between recognition and revelation that 8ON8’s old-meets-new identity shines.
AW25
Fabrics are the centre of Gong’s masterpieces, as he weaves a “river in time” through his creative process. “I’m drawn to fabrics with raw, honest textures – they speak to authenticity in ways polished materials can’t.” Whether it’s rugged, coated cotton, ultra-thin, fluid wool or sparkling sequins on a dark woollen suit, each textile is chosen for the story it can tell. Recycled and sustainable pieces are also a huge aspect of Gong’s work. He says, “The rise of sustainable solutions – plant-based dyes, up-cycling fabrics – allows us to push boundaries while honouring environmental responsibility. This ethos also lives at 8ON8’s heart: where every aesthetic innovation considers its ecological footprint.”
Since debuting at London Fashion Week in 2019, Gong has used the runway as his stage for visual storytelling. His first collection, SS20, was an explosion of retro colours. Taking a painterly approach, the palette featured an array of tennis-court greens, cream whites and cobalt blues that collided with the neutrals tones of wool, velvet and cotton. These then took shape as suits that could morph from office wear to street statement with a single undone fastening, a striped dress and two-shade white trench coats with electric hues that peek out from inside storm flaps. Gong’s fascination with proportion shone through in this collection, with sleeves draped just a little too long and shirts hanging out from under blazers. “The runway has always been a space I cherish – it’s where I communicate most directly with my audience,” he says. “Only when environment, models and music resonate together can the audience truly feel and understand 8ON8’s story.”
8 Years of 8ON8
Li Gong describes 8ON8 as being “like a storybook”, with each season’s theme being drawn from lived experiences. “Every collection presents a surreal snapshot of life, showcasing the personalities of characters within these scenes. They are all fragments of myself, expressing my beautiful and absurd imagination of life,” he adds. In his most recent AW25 collection, he captured childlike innocence through “The Way Home”, with candy being a significant motif that popped up throughout the collection, as candy-shaped hair clips, on bubble sole sock trainers filled with mini sweets and as 3D appliqués on jumpers.
Now in its eighth year, 8ON8 is entering what Gong calls its “most symbolic chapter.” The label has become his compass, a bridge between nostalgia and innovation. “We will continue building 80N8’s unique surrealistic world – making it more visual, physical, and spatial, allowing more people to immerse themselves within it,” he says, imagining the next chapter of what it will look like for the future of 8ON8. To celebrate the anniversary, he’s released a limited-edition sustainable collection of keychains spun from eight years of leftover fabrics, grommet-punctured bags and white tees patched with a selection of the brand’s most iconic graphics from past seasons.
For Gong, the future isn’t just some distant horizon; it’s already present, woven into the cut of a vintage-style jacket or the shimmer of a ’80s sequin. At 8ON8, looking back only serves to move things forward.
Photography courtesy of 8ON8.
Li Gong
