I spent a large part of my life becoming very good at making the sensible choice.
Before asking whether I wanted something, I learned to ask whether it was practical, whether other people would understand it, whether it would make them proud, and whether it fit the version of life that seemed responsible or respectable. When you spend enough time thinking that way, it can become surprisingly difficult to tell the difference between the life you have chosen for yourself and the life you have simply learned how to choose.
When I began thinking about the first handbag for XU, I knew I did not want to begin with a silhouette and then search for a story that could justify it afterward. I wanted the story to come first. I wanted to find an object whose form could influence the design of the bag, while its history and meaning could explain something larger about why I was creating XU in the first place.
That object became 如意, or ruyi.
The Object
Today, ruyi is often described as a Chinese sceptre, but that description only captures one part of its history. Its earlier forms are believed to have developed from a practical implement similar to a backscratcher, and over the centuries, both its purpose and its appearance changed significantly.
By the Tang dynasty, the ruyi had begun moving away from its utilitarian origins. By the Ming and Qing dynasties, it had become an increasingly refined object associated with scholars, the imperial court, ceremony, display, gifting, and auspicious wishes. Surviving examples were made from jade, wood, bamboo, metal, cloisonné, and other materials. Some were highly elaborate, while others were far more restrained.
What interested me was not simply that the ruyi had a long history, but that it had never really been one fixed thing. Its materials changed, its function changed, its context changed, and its visual language changed with them.
What remained remarkably persistent was its name.
如意 is commonly translated as “as you wish” or “according to one’s wishes.” Ruyi were often given as gifts because of the good wishes contained in those two characters, and during the Qing dynasty they could be presented on significant occasions such as imperial weddings, birthdays, Lunar New Year celebrations, and enthronements. They could sit beside a throne, rest on a scholar’s table, be carried, collected, or exchanged.
What began to fascinate me was the idea that an object could become a physical expression of a wish.
The Meaning I Could Not Stop Thinking About
At first, I thought I was drawn to the ruyi because of its shape. Its curved head already suggested something architectural to me, and I could imagine that line becoming the flap of a handbag. I could see the potential for cloud forms to become carving, and I could see how the proportions of the original object might begin influencing the structure of something entirely different.
The longer I researched it, however, the more I realized that the shape was only one part of what kept pulling me back.
I kept returning to those two characters and to the meaning contained in them.
“As you wish” sounds simple, and in some ways it is. People should be able to choose what they want for their own lives. Yet the question can become much more complicated when you have spent years measuring yourself against expectations, obligations, and the comfort of the people around you.
You begin to ask whether something is sensible before asking whether it matters to you. You begin to think about what will be accepted before thinking about what you actually want. You learn to become practical, agreeable, accomplished, or easy to understand, and eventually the question of what you truly wish for can become strangely unfamiliar.
That was the question that stayed with me.
What would you actually choose if the answer did not need to impress anyone, reassure anyone, or fit someone else’s idea of a good life?
The more I thought about it, the more I realized that the question had become much larger than the handbag.
It had become part of what XU was about.
Heritage Does Not Have to Remain Still
The more I learned about the ruyi, the more interested I became in the fact that the object had already been evolving for centuries.
The ruyi associated with later periods was not identical to the earlier practical object from which it developed. Its makers had repeatedly changed its materials, proportions, decoration, function, and context. What it meant to people shifted over time, and the object continued to acquire new associations while still retaining something of its identity.
That history gave me permission to think about heritage differently.
Preserving history does not always have to mean freezing an object in the exact form in which we found it. Sometimes carrying something forward means understanding it deeply enough to recognize what is essential, what can change, and what can take on a new form without losing the idea that made it meaningful in the first place.
That distinction became central to the way I wanted to design XU.
I was not interested in taking a historical symbol and applying it to a handbag simply so that the bag would appear Chinese. I wanted to begin with the object itself and ask more fundamental questions about it. I wanted to understand why it looked the way it did, what it meant, how it had already changed, and which parts of its identity could survive another translation.
That became the process behind the design.
Research the object, understand its history, study its form, identify what matters, and then allow those ideas to evolve into something new.
From Ruyi to Handbag
For the Ruyi handbag, the translation begins with the most recognizable part of the historical object, which is the distinctive curve of its head. That curve becomes the line of the flap, while cloud forms associated with ruyi imagery are translated into carving in the leather.
The proportions, hardware, material choices, and surface details are considered as parts of the same system. I wanted the bag to feel contemporary, but I also wanted someone to be able to look at it, ask why it had been designed that way, and discover that there was a reason behind those decisions.
That distinction matters to me because the Ruyi is not meant to be a conventional handbag with Chinese decoration added after the fact.
The historical object sits underneath the design.
Its form informs the proportions, its history provides context, its name provides meaning, and its own evolution provides a precedent for reinterpretation.
That is how I think about the difference between using heritage as decoration and allowing heritage to become part of the design language itself.
Why It Had to Come First
The meaning I found in 如意 was never about telling someone what they should wish for, because that would contradict the entire idea.
What moved me was the possibility that a wish could actually belong to you.
There will eventually be other objects, other histories, and other questions for XU to explore, but this was the idea I needed to begin with. Before I could think about anything else, I wanted to begin with intention and with the question of what a person chooses to carry forward when that choice is truly their own.
When I first encountered the meaning of 如意, I thought I had found the name of an object. The more I researched it, the more it began to feel like a question I had been avoiding for much longer.
After years of living according to what was expected of me, “as you wish” began to feel less like a blessing and more like permission.
A Question to Carry With You
If nobody else needed to understand your answer, approve of it, or be impressed by it, what would you actually choose for yourself?