The secret of Shanza Yousong that is learned by global brands?

If you've been to Huaihai Middle Road in Shanghai recently and passed by the flagship store of Song Under the Hill, chances are you'll stop: not because of the window display, but because of the queue.

On Friday afternoons, this stretch of the street is even busier than on weekends. There are a few people in front of the tea shop window, and some are taking pictures in front of the optician's. Only in front of Song Under the Hill is there a queue, with people of different ethnicities, and only a few speaking Chinese.

In front of the flagship store of Song Under the Hill on Huaihai Middle Road. Image source: Xiaohongshu user @An Xiaogu 🐰

As China's visa - free policy continues to expand, according to the Shanghai Municipal Administration of Culture and Tourism, in 2025, the number of inbound foreign tourists received by Shanghai increased by nearly 50% year - on - year. Among their "Chinese specialty" shopping lists, Song Under the Hill, along with brands like Pop Mart, has become a new specialty.

Fashion media LADYMAX believes that Chinese brands that can attract foreign tourists must meet at least two conditions: having both aesthetics and design, and providing high - quality offline retail experiences. Song Under the Hill is being included in this category. This queuing phenomenon started two years ago. According to domestic and foreign media such as Global Times, more than half of the customers at the Shanghai flagship store of Song Under the Hill are from overseas, and this proportion is even higher during overseas holidays.

Overseas users sharing Song Under the Hill

On overseas social media, many foreign tourists share that they buy five or six bags at once. The question that clerks are often asked repeatedly is not the price, but whether there are other colors for this bag - the answer is usually yes, but there is no stock. Some people have waited for a color scheme for three months, and some have specifically set the store as the first stop of their Shanghai itinerary and rushed to Huaihai Middle Road on the day of arrival.

The price difference is one of the most direct incentives - due to costs such as tariffs and shipping, the price of Song Under the Hill overseas is about 40% higher than in China - but this cannot explain the emergence of purchasing agents. On overseas social media, a group of professional buyers targeting Song Under the Hill have emerged. They are willing to pay in advance, bring the products into the country manually, and resell them to local consumers - which shows the intensity of the demand.

In the story of Song Under the Hill, the emergence of purchasing agents has a deeper meaning. For a long time, the classic Chinese purchasing model was one - way: Chinese consumers asked people to buy Western products overseas and bring them back, and more than half of luxury consumption occurred overseas. Now, the opposite is happening - overseas consumers are actively building infrastructure to transport products of a Chinese brand out.

Overseas netizens seeking to buy Song Under the Hill products

For the vast majority of overseas users, they have never listened to the Chinese podcast "Sounds Under the Hill" of Song Under the Hill, have never entered the brand's spacious and simple offline stores, and do not know any Chinese - faced brand ambassadors of Song Under the Hill.

Since Song Under the Hill established its independent overseas brand website in 2021, it has not entered the overseas market in a high - profile way - no large - scale social media advertising, no heavy investment in overseas celebrity endorsements, and no strong presence in overseas channels (only one store in Bangkok overseas) … In short, no explosive marketing.

So, what makes Song Under the Hill trigger the overseas purchasing agent phenomenon?

01. The product speaks for itself

In many people's eyes, the popularity of Song Under the Hill overseas has been accumulated bit by bit through word - of - mouth.

The head of an international public relations agency told 36Kr that Song Under the Hill only started consulting them about overseas market public relations business last year. This shows that at least six years after opening the independent website, the brand did not make substantial overseas expansion. All this reminds people of the brand's declaration many years ago - "Be a bit honest and a bit slow." The brand's meticulous craftsmanship has become part of its DNA.

This slowness is most intuitively reflected in the process refinement. Few people know that the production process of a high - end handbag involves more than 200 steps and requires the careful combination of more than 100 independent parts. To this day, six or seven out of ten processes of luxury bags still have to be completed by the hands of craftsmen, which is the warmth that machines cannot replicate. It is understood that the complexity of Song Under the Hill's bags is three times that of other domestic brands on the market. Some product series with delicate and complex designs require a lot of manual work - which is also the reason why some popular products are often out of stock.

The hardware components are all independently developed and custom - cast by the brand. A book - clasp hardware piece of just a few centimeters has up to 18 parts. The surface of these hardware components is vibrated with fine stones repeatedly and then manually refined, leaving a fine texture to simulate the natural texture of years of erosion.

If the above details are the craftsmanship that consumers can feel, another valuable aspect of Song Under the Hill is that it is willing to spend some "stupid" efforts on things that are easily overlooked.

Take leather treatment as an example: the brand first selects thick leather, drums it for several hours to make it naturally shrink into a three - dimensional texture, and then thins it - the final result is a piece of leather that is light in weight but solid in hand. If thin leather is used directly, the texture is flat, lacking in texture and three - dimensionality. When cutting, the front of the bag uses a whole piece of cowhide without splicing, which means a higher material loss rate, but there are no seams on the front - many products at the same price on the market have three or four pieces of spliced leather on the front and even the bottom of the bag.

Over the past seven years, the popular "Basket Bag (Song Bag)" has quietly gone through several iterations. The number of cutting pieces has increased from 45 to 60, and the process has become several times more complex to achieve a more beautiful bag shape and durability - consumers may not be aware of these changes, but the brand has been constantly improving.

The materials used in the bags are also of high quality. Most of the leather comes from European countries such as Spain and is full - grain A - grade top - layer cowhide, directly meeting luxury standards from the source of the leather. The hardware uses the craftsmanship standards of jewelry and watches. 316L stainless steel is plated with 999 pure gold using a vacuum - plating process, attaching gold ions to the steel surface under high - temperature and high - pressure conditions. Against the background of the continuous rise in gold prices, this process cost is still fully retained. Compared with the conventional water - galvanized alloy in the industry, the wear resistance and precision are greatly improved, the luster lasts longer, and no water is used in the entire electroplating process.

Comparison between the old and new versions of Song Under the Hill's Song Bag. Image source: Xiaohongshu user @On the way

In the few public reports, Fu Song, the brand founder of Song Under the Hill, shows an almost paranoid product thinking: she is enthusiastic when talking about the details and production process of the bags, but is not willing to talk much about growth expectations and scale - this does not quite match the image of a brand with over - billion - yuan sales in the outside world. "Product talks" is a phrase that Fu Song often mentions, which is quite unique in the fashion industry. And facts have proved that this approach may be the right one.

On Trustpilot, a shopping website known as the "yelp" of e - commerce, Song Under the Hill ranks first among Chinese luggage and bag enterprises with a score of 4.6 (out of 5). In the review section, most customers emphasize the brand's "versatility and meticulous design" and often mention "its sturdy hardware and excellent sewing craftsmanship." In contrast, some international luxury brands score 1.6 or 1.2.

A user who wrote a long - form review directly stated on the blog Fairly Curated: "The Song Bag (the 'Basket Bag') of Song Under the Hill is better designed and more worthy than the Picotin. If I had encountered the Song Bag first, I might not have bought the Picotin at all." - This was unimaginable 10 years ago.

Image source: Fairly Curated

An overseas professional blogger who focuses on in - depth reviews of luggage and bag quality, after disassembling the Crescent Bag of Song Under the Hill, placed it in the same category as brands like Polène. His review conclusion is: "This is a bag that I can whole - heartedly recommend."

"Song Under the Hill has one of the highest - quality leathers I've ever handled," said this blogger, who has millions of followers and is known for his independence and sharpness, defending his judgment. "Even if it's not better than the top European leathers, it's definitely not inferior... The design has smooth lines, is simple and neat, and the craftsmanship is impeccable. Then I saw the label: Made in China."

He then asked the thought - provoking question, "How can such a delicate and well - crafted thing come from a 'manufacturing hinterland' that has long been looked down upon by fashion elites?"

It's true that in the past few decades, China was the backdrop of the fashion industry - manufacturing but not being credited, producing but not being defined. Chinese fashion brands have never been internationally recognized in terms of aesthetic language. The emergence of Song Under the Hill shows us the possibility of Chinese brands telling the story of new oriental luxury with their own local language.

02. Modern understanding of Chinese - style design

The Crescent Bag launched in 2022 is one of the earliest bag styles of Song Under the Hill to become popular overseas. The simple arc - shaped body is a globally recognized modern design, but in terms of details, the slightly bulging arc of the bag's belly refers to the full and round shape of Song Dynasty Ru porcelain. By referring to the waxing and waning of the moon phase and combining traditional mortise - and - tenon structure with magnetic attraction, it can switch between the "half - moon" and "full - moon" shapes in one second.

Combining "functionality" and "beauty" is the characteristic of Song Under the Hill's design. "Internet thinking has given me the ability to create global products, user thinking, and engineering implementation ability, while Chinese culture has given me the soul," Fu Song once summarized. "We believe that Chinese brands should look inward, dig for inspiration and craftsmanship on this land - this land deserves to be seen by more people and deserves to be treated equally in terms of culture."

At first glance, Song Under the Hill's products look modern and do not immediately make people think of the label "Chinese style." But on closer inspection, its design language has a consistent root - growing from the Chinese local cultural soil, using Chinese forms and telling Chinese logic.

The upturned corners of the Eaves Bag are a modern interpretation of the flying eaves of Nanchansi Temple; the skeleton of the Basket Bag is inspired by the tension structure of kites; the tiger - tooth shape of the Trace - seeking series can be traced back to the Tibetan area at the source of the Yellow River, where this shape represents inner courage. Behind each bag, there is a traceable clue that extends into the specific folds of Chinese history and geography.

An international luxury brand attracted wide attention when it filmed at the Hanging Temple in Shanxi in 2025. However, Song Under the Hill filmed in Shanxi earlier. A pendant recently launched by the brand uses a mortise - and - tenon structure for opening and closing - this structure has previously appeared on the buckles of the Crescent Bag and the Brilliant series, and there are many such examples.

This design language does not stop at the product itself. It spreads outward along an invisible vein - first to space, then to narrative, and finally to identity.

The spatial layout of the Chengdu IFS store of Song Under the Hill imitates a bamboo valley; the Shanghai Huaihai Middle Road store tries to present a sense of flow like the mountain wind. In 2024 and 2025, Song Under the Hill participated in Paris Fashion Week for two consecutive years with the exhibition IP "SONG of MONT". The 2025 exhibition even built a two - story mountain - shaped installation, inspired by the "raindrop texture" technique in Fan Kuan's "