China’s coolest grandpa: farmer, 85, catapulted to fashion fame
Ding Bingcai, who survived famine, civil war and revolution, perfects suit and fedora look thanks to grandson
An elderly Chinese farmer who has lived through famine, civil war, revolution and one of the greatest economic booms in history has spoken of his delight at becoming an unlikely international fashion icon in his twilight years.
Ding Bingcai, 85, was catapulted into the headlines last month after his photographer grandson, Ding Guoliang, 30, made him the star of a fashion shoot for which he donned green, blue and mulberry suits, tartan bow ties, designer glasses and fedoras.
Photographs of the dapper grandfather-of-10 – who had never before worn a suit – quickly went viral with internet users anointing him “China’s coolest grandpa”.
One Chinese newspaper claimed the octogenarian trendsetter had achieved world-class levels of charm.
The English-language edition of the People’s Daily, the Communist party’s official mouthpiece, gushed: “The old man is totally turned into a heartthrob.”
Speaking on Monday with the help of his grandson, Ding said he had enjoyed his unforeseen transformation from farmer to fashionista.
“They are beautiful,” the softly spoken grandfather said of his grandson’s viral photographs.
The retired farmer said he was unable to pick his favourite look from his menswear collection. “I like all of them,” he told the Guardian.
Even more remarkable than Ding’s rise to fashion fame are the staggering social and political upheavals he has witnessed during his life.
Ding was born in 1931, six years after the death of China’s first president, Sun Yat-sen, and almost two decades before Chairman Mao’s communists seized power in 1949.
He grew up in Songshuping, a rural village on the outskirts of Fujian province’s Shaowu city and became a subsistence farmer, growing rice and cutting bamboo for a living.
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