It had become the custom for the leaders to don traditional clothes of the host country on the final day of the forum, and speculation about what form this would take had become a popular guessing game. However, in China that guessing took a serious turn, with earnest debate about what, in this context, the term "traditional Chinese" could possibly mean.

The result was the tangzhuang, a hybrid based on Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) clothing and other, more modern, elements. A little more than 20 years after China began to open up to the world, and just three weeks before it became a member of the World Trade Organization, the aim of the forum organizers was apparently to highlight not only the country's traditions but its modernity as well.

Zhao Jianhua, in his book The Chinese Fashion Industry: An Ethnographic Approach, says that the tangzhuang became extremely popular after the APEC meeting, but that in essence it was a fad that lasted for little more than a couple of years, even if the garment has become a set piece in the Chinese wardrobe.