Meet Shawna Wu, the Singapore-born designer blending tradition & pop culture

SINGAPORE – Shawna Wu trains like an anime heroine. That is to say, at length and ecstatically. The Singapore-born, Taiwanese fashion designer based in New York has for years made yearly trips to her motherland, where she stays for up to months at a time, studying ancient crafts under various teachers. On a video call with The Straits Times, she grimaces at the modern habit of airing all business on social media, then says self-consciously: “Basically, I’ve been learning silk weaving from the Taiwanese ‘National Living Treasure’. “It’s something I don’t post about at all because it’s so personal and…