The curtain fair in Keqiao, Shaoxing, has just concluded, sending a clear signal: the soft furnishing industry has completely moved away from the era of selling fabric by the meter. Immersive full-room displays replaced traditional sample stacking. Buyers no longer just look at fabric swatches; they walk into staged living rooms and bedrooms to experience the light and atmosphere created by curtains. This reflects a fundamental shift in business logic—price wars are over, and aesthetic appeal, styling ability, and spatial curation have become the new battleground.
Background
As a bellwether for the second half of the year, the fair highlighted three major trends: diversified styles, functional fabrics, and omni-channel operations. In terms of style, minimalism as a base, personalized accents, and a rise in national aesthetics dominated. Among these, the light Chinese style emerged as the biggest dark horse. Unlike the heavy and ornate traditional Chinese designs of previous years, the 2026 version uses soft low-saturation tones like light mist gray, milk coffee, and off-white, paired with simplified lines and delicate embroidery. This approach reduces heaviness and enhances transparency, perfectly matching the needs of modern large flat apartments and improved housing.
Fabric innovation is equally significant. Chenille and high-precision fabrics remain mainstream, but yarns are finer, weights are higher, and drape is improved, ideal for large floor-to-ceiling windows. Natural eco-friendly materials are surging in popularity—cotton-linen blends and Tencel textures have become hard requirements rather than added value. In window coverings, sheer fabrics that transmit light without transparency are now standard, turning sheers from supporting players into protagonists. Functional ready-made curtains with high blackout, sun resistance, and permanent shaping continue to gain traction. Blinds, honeycomb shades, and custom-shaped window treatments are expanding, making whole-home window covering integration a new profit driver for stores.
Industry Impact
Original design has officially become the core barrier to entry. The fair sent a clear message: independently developed patterns, original texture techniques, and exclusive colorways are more favored by buyers, while homogeneous copies are being phased out. This means the industry is shifting from scale-based competition centered on output and low prices to value-based competition centered on design, quality, and innovation. For source factories, R&D investment is no longer optional but a necessity for survival. For buyers, choosing suppliers with original design capabilities means gaining differentiated competitiveness in the end market.
Channel innovation is equally profound. The traditional model of waiting for customers to walk in is no longer viable. Short-video seeding, live-streaming cloud exhibitions for online traffic, combined with offline immersive experience for precise conversion, have become standard operating procedures. At this fair, online viewing numbers far exceeded offline footfall, with buyers selecting products online and negotiating orders offline—the full chain is now seamlessly connected. Meanwhile, Keqiao's 'exhibition-trade integration' advantage continues to expand, turning short-term fairs into year-round source markets. Buyers can capture annual trends at the fair and then visit the Beilian physical market to place orders directly with factories, significantly shortening the supply chain. With overseas buyers visiting continuously, domestic fabric brands are accelerating their global expansion, broadening the industry's market map.