Every time I read Yiling Wei sect AUs and they start describing what the sect members and leader wears its like, (direct quote from The Yiling Wei Sect and the Black Robed Lan by IvoryDragon48)
"[Wei Wuxian's hair] was pulled up into a high ponytail by a red ribbon with a gold and silver headpiece ornamenting and helping to direct the flow of his hair. The robes he wore were expensive looking with black being the dominant color and reds as the accents. The inner robe was a red so dark it looked like blood and the outer robe had simple yet elegant designs."
--And like, I get the urge to make them really cool looking and with themes or designs matching the other sects but like??? there's massive wasted potential here!!!
First, the hair. that's all well and good, but there is no way in hell that the Yiling Wei folks (Wen Remnants and others reviled/ostracized by society at large) are going to buy a gold guan OR a silver guan. why the hell would they bother spending precious resources on trying to impress people who already don't like them for something they literally have no control over.
But Wei Wuxian would know that he has to play the game now that he has people to protect, and going to a Con as a Sect Leader and not doing what all the other sect leaders are doing (wearing guan to say "I'M BETTER THAN YOU!!") is essentially outright stating that he holds no respect for any of them except in a way that could get him and his people killed. so instead, he goes "fuck it" and makes a guan out of something incredibly ordinary, like iron or wood, so now if anyone brings it up he can say "Oh, well, I like feeding my kids." or "Actually, I made this myself, all the better for carving protective arrays into!"
--And that's it. Wei Wuxian is a street kid he absolutely knows that rich people don't like to think about poor people and that they prefer to ignore them or hurt them. except you cant just attack someone who's being perfectly reasonably polite in public, especially when you just pointed out that he's 'poor'. Wei Wuxian's strategy is make them so fucking uncomfortable that they leave us alone.
(This would of course be after several years of no contact and no fighting so things have cooled off a bit)
Next, robes. No expensive robes. Let them be very well modified normal robes that have subtle stains and colour bleaching from sunlight and washing. The (shown, non-array-work) embroidery is at best amateur level, and Wei Wuxian will proudly show it off, loudly saying "a-Ning started a while back to help with his fine motor skills, and he's really come such a long way!!" and that "Oh, Xuanyu started practicing only recently but he's already so good at it!"
The Yiling Wei are the exact opposite of Lanling Jin. Wealth is to be used to benefit everyone and everyone is to be loved and appreciated for their work. The refusal to spend money of frivolous things is strong, especially when its something you could make yourself.
Self Ornamentation would not be jade or gold or silver or silks. It would be some nice wood, these feathers from the bird that likes me, hey look at this cool rock I found I'm gonna polish it like a gemstone, I dug these awesome bones out of my grandmama's garden you think I can do anything with 'em?
Yiling Wei folks are death druids.
