Vest, also known as vest, armor, half-arm, tight-fitting, vest, hood armor, etc. There are square collar, vertical collar, round collar, chicken collar, Jin Gangzuan collar and V collar. There are many styles of lapels, such as straight lapels, pull lapels, double lapels and straight lapels. Among them, double lapels and large lapels are common lapels, and the hem of the vest is generally split on both sides. There were also waistcoats without slits in the Qing Dynasty. Later, influenced by the west, the decorative structure also showed a combination of Chinese and western styles, moving closer from tradition to modern vest.
At first, vests were mostly worn under clothes and used as underwear. The length of the vest is generally at the waist. Compared with wide-sleeved robes, vests are much lighter, especially convenient for labor, and are the daily clothes of working people.
The porters in The Riverside Scene at Qingming Festival in Song Dynasty are characterized by wrapping their coats around their waists, revealing sleeveless tops, and tying them with wide strips of cloth on both sides, which is convenient for labor. This proves that the vest kept the function of underwear for a long time before the coat. At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Republic of China, vests were often worn by ordinary men, especially workers. They wore them alone and tied them around their waist with a belt to facilitate movement.