Determining a person's social status is far more complex than simply recognizing their face.
Zou Yaqi, a graduate of the Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing, China, set out to challenge this notion with a bold experiment. For 21 days, she lived for free by posing as a socialite, seamlessly blending into the world of the wealthy.
She lounged in the lavish lobbies of five-star hotels, sampled high-end snacks in shopping malls, tried on luxurious jade bracelets at auctions, and even wore designer clothing—all without spending a dime.
When she shared snippets of her experience through short video clips on Weibo, her experiment quickly sparked controversy, igniting debates about privilege, perception, and the nature of social status.
"During those 21 days, I received an estimated 10,000 yuan’s worth in products and services as giveaways. I basically presented myself as a young, beautiful socialite. Occasionally, I would play the role of a pregnant woman; in order to sleep in hotel lobbies, I would play the part of a wife trying to catch her husband cheating. At auctions, I played the part of a collector, and at expos, I was a cosplayer."
They triggered heated discussion about class, privilege, and wealth inequality.
While she literally scammed her way to the top, Zou doesn't consider herself a scammer.
This is because the project was part of her graduation thesis.
She recorded her own experience of being a socialite on a video to be played at the academy
She said that the project had stemmed from her long-standing interest in whether a person could live on the "excessive material" produced by society.
But to ensure her own safety, she had chosen places she felt were relatively safe, such as hotel lobbies, and the popular Chinese hot pot chai HaiDiLao.
She said that she has an interest on how items and the privileges are distributed, and how they're usually assigned to people who look like they already have sufficient wealth in life.
She said that influential people, including the rich, can enjoy sleeping at extravagant hotel lobbies for free, shower in the airport and use hotel beaches for free, eat at weddings or buffets, or enjoy snacks and wine at auctions.
All that by just showing up.
"So I pretended to be one such person [...] and lived off these excessive materials."
The idea sparked after her successful mockumentary, where she previously pretended to survive seven days in Beijing without spending any money. Afterward, she found making a mockumentary was inspiring. And with that experience, she started the project, but for real this time.
"I figured I could actually survive in Beijing without spending money for 21 days," she said.
In an example, she recalled how she was asked by her mother to buy a wristwatch for her father as a birthday gift. At the time, she was given a pretty sizable budget, so she went to a high-end watch store there. And because it was Christmas, coincidentally, the store was staffed by "tall and handsome male models."
"As soon as I entered, the models would ply me with Christmas cakes and candies. Then they’d pour me some milk tea. If I was going in to purchase luxury goods, I wouldn’t lack money to buy sweets and milk tea—those were free perks," she said.
"If I was homeless, would I be able to walk into that store, score some free milk tea and candy, and then leave? Because that time, I didn’t buy anything. That experience got me thinking: If I could play the part of a very wealthy person, could I live off these freebies? I decided to make my thesis a performance art project, putting that idea into practice."
But to ensure the success of her project, she knows that she had to look rich in the first place.
"I bought a fake Hermès bag that could hold a lot stuff. It could help me create my socialite persona, as well as carry all my things. My outfit was velvet, with an athleisure feel. I wore a mink coat over it, which kept me warm and made me look rich," she continued.
"I prepared a makeup bag and some makeup remover to make sure I could be impeccably styled each day. I would give myself bright red lips to give a sense of hauteur, and sometimes I’d wear sunglasses as well."
"I spent 18 yuan on a fake diamond ring, and prepared two necklaces to wear in turn. One was a counterfeit Vivienne Westwood necklace, and the other was a fake pearl necklace. The pearls were incredibly shiny, like the reflectors on a sanitation worker’s vest."
"Many people said I was a real socialite. They even made a tongue-twister like an infinite nesting doll: 'A real socialite playing a fake socialite playing a real socialite…' That meant I did a good job acting, so I was happy to hear them speak with such certainty. But in all truth, I’m a proletarian—I go to thrift stores to shop their 12-items-for-100-yuan deals, and put my outfits together at home," she said.
In the end, Zao did feel guilty about her project, including how she felt bad for all those people she had deceived.
"But I didn’t really harm anyone," she said.
The project has received mixed reactions in China.
Some said such discussion is meaningful, while some called her experiment "a prank to get free food and drinks."
Another referred to sneaking into a first-class airport lounge as “using a policy loophole."
Many said that she was "pretending to be a socialite" and "took advantage of a highly extravagant lifestyle," with the word "fake socialite" appearing in the headlines of several viral blog pieces about her project.
Some even compared her to the fake German heiress Anna Sorokin, who is in jail after doing the same thing.
But unlike Anna, Zao said that her project isn't about benefiting herself.
Zou has responded on Weibo to her critics, saying she is not a socialite and only looked like one due to her long preparation for the project, and that her intention was not to examine wealth inequality or define what a socialite is
"Prosperity gap and class stratification are only temporary, the public will reach common prosperity sooner or later," she wrote.
In China, the gap between rich and poor has become an increasingly divisive social issue following China’s rapid rise in prosperity in recent decades.
And here, wealth inequality has surfaced as a major concern again recently following a government crackdown on celebrity pay, with the earnings of top stars like Zheng Shuang under scrutiny when it was revealed she earned more in a day than most people would in a year.
