London (CNN) -- In the months before Vogue China launched in 2005, there were many skeptics, people who said it would fail because China's nascent luxury market was not ready for a world-class glossy magazine -- consumers there were just not sophisticated enough. At the time, the nouveaux riche were in the grip of bling fever, undiscerningly buying the most expensive goods they could afford in order to show off their success, according to a 2005 report by consultants Ernst & Young. But where some saw a problem, Angelica Cheung, Vogue China's editor-in-chief since 2005, saw an opportunity: "We believed that China was going to experience a fast-changing period and consumers would change very quickly," she tells CNN.
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Vogue China editor-in-chief Angelica Cheung: Luxury market "multi-layered"
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Global luxury brands are failing to connect with Chinese consumers
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Bling and status symbols not all that concern Chinese consumers now
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Luxury analyst: It's time brands refined products, introduced edgier concepts
Cheung says that while it was very easy to describe @placeholder consumers 10 years ago, it's not so easy today: