Pajamas have been the standard sleepwear in the west for generations. So much so that in American parlance the word "pajamas" has come to mean any clothes one sleeps in, not just the standard loose pants and button down shirt the word still refers to elsewhere in the English speaking world. From flannel to cotton, plaid to little pink hearts, the fashion possibilities of pajamas are endless. And those possibilities have begun to extend even past questions of cut and style and into questions of place. These days in the States pajama pants have left the bedroom and entered the world of student fashion. Particularly near major universities, it’s not unusual to see students trudging to class or around town in brightly colored pajamas. Chinese cities then, especially Shanghai, have either a very high concentration of fashion conscious university students, or something else is going on when people stroll through the streets in their pajamas.

The evolution of pajamas (or pyjama if you please) begins in 19th century India when British colonists borrowed the local manner of dress but changed the context: whereas originally pajama pants were daily wear for local Indian men, the British appropriated pajamas -- with added button down shirt -- as sleepwear. Pajamas quickly became universally popular throughout the western world, eventually extending to women’s wear as well as men’s.

There are a couple of theories floating around the Internet about why Shanghainese so love to wear their pajamas as daily wear: some say it’s too hot for anything else (3) and others have more complex theories – that because of Shanghai’s tight living quarters people expanded their idea of what constituted the home to include neighborhood sidewalks and streets, thus allowing them to wear pajamas "in the home" while in the street(2).

Perhaps this theory has some truth to it; perhaps Shanghainese people do see the entire neighborhood as "home" rather than just the actual buildings in which they live. But then again, this theory may be altogether too complex. If the British can borrow Indian dress but change how it’s worn to suit their own tastes, why can’t it simply be that the Chinese have done the same with Western dress?  Ordinary people wear pajamas while they’re out and about, plumbers wear full suits and dress shoes to bang away at the pipes and female Chinese tourists wear stylish cocktail dresses to the Temple of Heaven at two o’clock in the afternoon in the height of summer. And who are we pajamas-in-the-bedroom types to say nay?

Reference:
1) Answer.com

2) Chinadaily.com.cn

3) cbw.com

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