Love Designer Review

Love Designer (幸福触手可及) is also known as Love Advanced Customization. When I first come across the title, it sounds kind of weird to me. But after having watched the drama, I understand why the title is as such. The background setting for this romance drama revolves around clothes designing. Later, the male lead is striving to create an app that allows for online customization of clothes according to buyers’ body measurements. The theme is interesting but is the whole drama worth watching? I will explore further in my Love Designer review below.

My rating: 7/10
Episodes: 45
Type: Romance
Aired: May 2020
Images Credit: Tencent

The Cast Of Love Designer

• Dilraba Dilmurat as Zhou Fang
• Johnny Huang Jing Yu as Song Lin
• Viann Zhang Xin Yu as Qin Qing
• Yi Da Qian as Zuo Yu Lin
• Hu Bing as Su Yu Shan
• Cao Yu Chen as Huo Chen Dong
• Zhao Xin as Chen Pei Pei
• Wang Yi Ming as Shen Di
• Christine Zheng Shui Jing as Song Luo
• Zhang Dou Dou as Lu Na
• Shi An as Wang He
• Zhu Yin as Li Ru Hui

Main Characters

Zhou Fang

Zhou Fang is a novice clothes designer. She is independent-minded and determined in achieving her dreams of establishing her own brand. Her best friend is Qin Qing whom she has known since school days. Zhou Fang has loving parents. Her mother is Li Ru Hui who tends to be over-anxious about Zhou Fang’s matrimonial happiness. She also has an ex-fiancee, Wang Ze Yang, who cheated on her.

Song Lin

Song Lin is a wealthy and principled businessman who runs an online designer clothes company, Wan Feng. He is a very rational and confident man. His life revolves around work which makes him seem cold. He has a younger sister, Song Luo, who is under his care since their parents have died.

Qin Qing

Qin Qing comes from a rich family. She is a jewelry designer with her own store. Coming from a privileged background, Qin Qing tends to be willful and pampered. But she is a loyal friend who would not hesitate to offer a helping hand.

Zuo Yu Lin

Yu Lin is a fresh graduate working in Wan Feng. He catches the eye of Song Lin with his talent and hard work. Yu Lin is an honest and responsible man who is mature for his age. His love interest is Qin Qing whom he relentlessly pursues.

Supporting Characters

Su Yu Shan

Yu Shan is the majority owner of Bai Sai which is also involved in selling designer clothes. He is Song Lin’s major business rival. They have a history between them that can be traced back to April. Yu Shan will not hesitate to bend the rules in order to take down Song Lin. He has a wife, Zhen Zhen, but their marriage is exactly a loving one.

Huo Chen Dong

Chen Dong is a banker. He is also a friend and an ex-school mate of Zhou Fang and Qin Qing. He just moves back to Shanghai and pursues Zhou Fang when they meet up again.

Chen Pei Pei

Pei Pei is a reporter and news writer. She gets entangled with Zhou Fang due to Wang Ze Yang who is her boyfriend.

Shen Di

Shen Di is Zhou Fang’s nephew. He is a high school student who has just moved to Shanghai and is temporarily under Zhou Fang’s care.

Song Luo

Song Luo is Song Lin’s younger sister. She has a rebellious streak and cannot get along with her brother. She often creates mischiefs in school which Song Lin has to attend to. Shen Di is her new classmate and sits next to her.

Lu Na

Lu Na is a famous celebrity and Wan Feng’s ambassador. She loves Song Lin and can be deceitful towards her love rivals. Lu Na is jealous of Zhou Fang and often makes things difficult for her.

Wang He

Wang He is Song Lin’s friend and subordinate. He has a crush on Lu Na for years but keeps it to himself as he knows Lu Na loves Song Lin.

Li Ru Hui

Ru Hui is Zhou Fang’s mother. She is always pressuring Zhou Fang to find a boyfriend and get married as she is afraid her daughter will become unwanted. She likes Chen Dong whom she thinks will make good husband material for Zhou Fang.

Synopsis

Zhou Fang is getting married to Wang Ze Yang. But she finds out that he has been cheating on her with Shen Pei Pei during their wedding photo shoot. In her anger and disappointment, she ends up walking down a deserted road and nearly getting hit by Song Lin’s motorbike. They meet again when Zhou Fang is left with a shell company and lawsuit due to Ze Yang’s deceit. Zhou Fang and Ze Yang have been running a business making and selling clothes. But Ze Yang has stolen designs from Song Lin’s company to make counterfeit clothes for sale. Hence, Song Lin sues Zhou Fang’s company for compensation.

Their interactions increase when her nephew, Shen Di, comes to live with her temporarily and ends up as his sister’s classmate. Song Lin begins to fall in love with Zhou Fang and woos her. But his interest in her invites trouble for Zhou Fang due to Lu Na’s jealousy and problems created by his business rival, Su Yu Shan. In the meantime, Zhou Fang is determined to rediscover her dream of becoming a clothes designer rather than selling other people’s designs. She faces numerous obstacles along the way as she builds her own brand name as Song Lin tries his best to protect her.

Will Zhou Fang succeed in achieving her dream? How will Song Lin and Zhou Fang handle all the obstacles that arise in their relationship?

Love Designer Ending (Spoilers Alert!)

Well, no prize for guessing. Being a romance drama, Love Designer does have a happy ending. Zhou Fang tells Song Lin that she is pregnant in the last scene where they are back on a road along the coast where they first met. It has been more than 6 months since they got married. They are a sweet and loving married couple. You can read the Love Designer episode summary if you want a full recap of the drama. Their relationship works mainly because Song Lin allows her the space to do what she thinks is right for her business although they may be working for different companies. In return, Zhou Fang loves him more because of it. Both of them have their principles when it comes to doing business.

Did Qin Qing End Up With Yu Lin?

Yes, Qin Qing ends up together with Yu Lin. She manages to win her mother-in-law over with her sincere words. Ms. Tian also feels lonely if she were to remain antagonistic towards Qin Qing. After all, Yu Lin has quarreled with her over her persistent interference in Qin Qing’s life. Yu Lin and Qin Qing did get married although they did not hold a wedding ceremony. In the end, they went to Europe for a vacation wedding.

If you are wondering why Yu Lin’s mother is against their relationship, it is because Qin Qing was her student in school. But Qin Qing was very naughty and rebellious back then and Yu Lin’s mother has a very bad impression on her. So, she thinks that Qin Qing is not compatible with her son. In the first episode, Yu Lin already knew who Qin Qing is as they were schoolmates. But Qin Qing doesn’t recognize Yu Lin is as he was her junior. Yu Lin already has a crush on her during his school days.

Chen Dong And Pei Pei

Nothing happened between Chen Dong and Pei Pei although he knows that she loves him. Chen Dong is at Song Lin and Zhou Fang’s wedding ceremony but leaves halfway through to go to the airport. He decides to leave Shanghai to Pei Pei’s disappointment.

What Happened To Lu Na?

Lu Na faded into the background halfway through the drama but reappears briefly in the last episode. She is still a famous celebrity but she now has Wang He as her manager.

Why Su Yu Shan Hates Song Lin

Su Yu Shan has an obsession with April who was also a clothes designer. They used to work together and Su Yu Shan made her work hard to build their business. But April died young. Su Yu Shan was not by her side when she died but busy with business. He couldn’t forget her although he has since got married to Zhen Zhen.

April was Ms. Cheng’s daughter while Ms. Cheng is Song Lin’s mentor. When April died, Ms. Cheng gave April’s brand name to Song Lin to manage. Hence, Su Yu Shan has always wanted to take over Song Lin’s company and continues to regard him as a rival. He only stops thinking as such when Song Lin helps him out of his corporate troubles towards the end. He also changes his life priorities when his wife is considering divorcing him and yet helps him to overcome his financial difficulties. In the end, he quits the corporate world to indulge in making coffee at his cafe and reconciles with his wife.

Love Designer Review – Sweetness Is Its Selling Point

I would say watching Love Designer is like watching 2 lovers learning to trust and get along after falling in love. To me, the plot is pretty simple overall. The first half is roughly about handling obstacles created by a jealous woman who loves Song Lin and learning the ropes of doing business amidst business rivalry. The second half is about working towards a solid relationship as both parties encounter changes in their career. You don’t feel any major ups and downs in the whole drama unlike Blossom In Heart or even Skate Into Love.

Basically, the problems the couple face are not magnified to the extent that they make viewers feel a lot of angst. But neither is it perfectly smooth-sailing like Love 020. I think the drama emphasizes the sweetness but downplays the obstacles and quarrels. The disagreements are there to make the drama closer to reality but at the same time, the sweetness overdose give viewers what they want in a romance story. It is really the main selling point of Love Designer to me.

Chemistry Between the Leads

You really need good chemistry between the main leads to make this kind of drama watchable. So, we have to thank Dilraba Dilmurat and Johnny Huang for that. They played their roles well to give viewers a very down-to-earth and sweet couple to savor. Their chemistry is up to mark with their very natural interactions with each other. You can see the difference between them and the second couple played by Viann Zhang and Yi Da Qian.

The second couple is less inspiring to watch because the chemistry is obviously lacking. While the relationship dynamics of this couple is perhaps framed by the older woman and younger man conundrum, the way they interact doesn’t feel as pleasurable to watch. A couple with an age gap problem doesn’t mean they can’t have a great chemistry because Victoria Song and Song Wei Long certainly stood out in Find Yourself.

The Fashionable Clothes

Well, Love Designer is about the journey of a clothes designer. So, naturally, they have to invest quite a bit on the fashion side of things. The result is viewers are treated to beautiful dresses, chic casual wear, and professional-looking suits. Most of the characters are well-dressed in every scene which suit their profession and social status. So, even if you don’t enjoy the show, at the very least there are nice clothes to look at!

Half-Cooked Side Plots

If there is one major thing that bothers me about Love Designer, it is the poor execution of the side plots. They give the feeling that these are written in just to add to the length of the drama because they are not properly tied up in the end. For instance, I don’t know why they bother with Chen Dong and Pei Pei. This pair’s story is not fully told. Neither is Lu Na’s story. She disappears midway through and reappears in the last episode. We are not told what happened to her in between.

The worst is Su Yu Shan’s relationship with April. It is not adequately explained the nature of his relationship with her and why he is so obsessed about acquiring Wan Feng and taking down Song Lin. The history of the 3 of them are missing. We can only guess from conversations here and there between the various characters to obtain bits and pieces of information of what happened in the past.

In short, the side stories are loose and not adequately explored. They don’t ruin the drama that much but can be a little annoying.

My Verdict

Personally, I think it is hard to stretch a modern day romance drama to more than 40 episodes unless there are interesting sub-plots to keep it going. Thus, Love Designer could have been shorter because the story of the main couple has more or less concluded by Episode 40 as they have overcome all the major problems between them. The remaining 5 episodes are merely fillers and feel good scenes. As a result, we are mainly treated to the second couple’s story in the last few episodes. If you don’t care for this couple, then Love Designer can feel draggy as it inches towards the ending.

However, I would still recommend a watch for this Love Designer review with a 7/10 rating. Watch it for the main couple’s chemistry and if you are a romance drama fan, their sweetness can’t be missed. There are quite a number of kisses in the drama from light pecks to hot and passionate. Unfortunately, they have censored a few kissing scenes as well. Maybe they need to cut down on the number to avoid overdoing it as too many kisses can be uncomfortable for some.

Overall, Love Designer is sweet with enough fluff and a little bit of angst. If you prefer to feel more emotionally invested in the ups and downs of the couple, then Here To Heart would be a better option for you with its melodrama. If you just want to escape from reality to indulge in a dreamy romance, then Intense Love would fulfill that need. Love Designer is simply a love journey of 2 mature individuals that progresses steadily to its conclusion which also makes it easily relatable. The love story itself is simple. It is the romantic and sugary display of affections that take it up a notch.

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