By Beth Main
The headlines on all of Taiwan’s newsstands today are for Taiwanese Canadian designer Jason Wu whose request to register the trademark Miss Wu was turned down by a Taiwanese court on Monday. Miss Wu is not his namesake brand that shot to fame in 2009 thanks to America’s first lady, but his new line for Nordstrom that debuted on Monday.
Despite impressing the fashion gods by designing both of Michelle Obama’s Inaugural Ball gowns, his native Taiwanese compatriots seem unimpressed, stating that the brand Miss Wu is too vague as Wu is a common surname. They were even less impressed with his argument that the brand name conjures up his signature image of an owl… you know ‘twit t-WU’… *cough*
Wu, now based in New York, emigrated from Taiwan to Canada aged nine and is a homeland favourite like Jeremy Lin. He should be flattered that the Intellectual Property Department think’s Miss Wu an unfitting name for their special designer golden boy, maybe something more along the lines of ‘Jason Wu is Taiwanese’ would suit the mold a bit better.