From young artisans revitalizing traditional crafts through modern design, to the ancient city of Fuzhou attracting global artists through openness, to terraced-field concerts in Guizhou boosting rural tourism—China is exploring a new pathway that integrates cultural heritage protection with the creative economy.

Young Artisans: Revitalizing Traditional Crafts Through Innovation

Across China, a new generation of artisans is breathing new life into age-old crafts such as textile weaving, porcelain making, sword forging, leather carving and embroidery. They preserve traditional techniques while expanding product boundaries through contemporary design.

Kong Yuhua (left), a young artisan from Nujiang Lisu Autonomous Prefecture, southwest China's Yunnan Province, learns traditional textile weaving techniques of the Dulong ethnic group from her grandmother.

[Photo by Huang Chenghao]

In Nujiang, Yunnan Province, Kong Yuhua, a young artisan of the Dulong ethnic group, learned traditional textile weaving from her grandmother. While retaining traditional Dulong motifs, she incorporates modern designs to create cultural and creative products, clothing and household items. By sharing weaving videos and stories online, she has brought this provincial-level intangible cultural heritage item from mountain villages to a wider audience. "My grandmother's works are full of memories and commitment, while mine reflect the craft's inheritance and future," she said.

Guo Xinyi (left), a young artisan from Liling, a county-level city in central China's Hunan Province, helps a girl try the pottery-making process.

[Photo via Hunan TR Gallery Co., Ltd.]

In Liling, Hunan Province, young artisan Guo Xinyi is working to bring traditional underglaze porcelain into everyday life. She has maintained the core techniques of hand-throwing and underglaze painting while developing cultural and creative souvenirs inspired by city landmarks, as well as pottery-making courses. "In my view, preserving traditional crafts does not mean sticking to established practices," Guo said. "True preservation requires using expressions and forms familiar to and popular among young people to bring Liling ceramics into everyday life."

Photo shows Zou Qi, an inheritor of the traditional Longquan sword-making craft in Longquan, east China's Zhejiang Province.

[Photo via People's Daily Online]

English: Zou Qi, from Longquan, Zhejiang Province, grew up in a family of sword makers. After graduating from university and working an office job, she began learning about sword-making in 2020 while helping her father promote Longquan swords through livestreaming. In 2021, she quit her job to devote herself fully to the craft. She has introduced brighter colors and creative motifs into traditional sword-making, and the first sword she helped make, "Phoenix Nirvana," won a gold award at a national exhibition of Chinese time-honored brands. She has also created cultural and creative products incorporating sword elements, including necklaces, fridge magnets and keychains.

Fuzhou: Keeping Cultural Heritage Alive through Openness and Exchange

Fuzhou, located on China's southeastern coast where the Minjiang River flows into the East China Sea, is a renowned historical and cultural city with a history spanning more than 2,200 years. In recent years, Fuzhou has prioritized conservation, preserving historic buildings, passing down traditional crafts and keeping the city's memories alive.

Italian artist Francesco Gomboli incorporates elements of traditional Chinese culture into his contemporary artwork in his studio.

[Photo via People's Daily Online]

Italian artist Francesco Gomboli has lived in Fuzhou for 15 years. Over the past two years, he began exploring Fuzhou's intangible cultural heritage in his artwork, creating cartoon self-portraits using lacquer, exploring hand-painted glass art, decorating men's hats with cork paintings and cutting original designs using traditional paper-cutting techniques. With support from local cultural and artistic platforms, Gomboli has held two solo exhibitions. Through training programs, dedicated spaces for preserving traditional skills and streets showcasing intangible cultural heritage, Fuzhou is bringing its traditional crafts and cultural heritage to wider audiences in new and diverse ways.

When Terraces Become Stage: Music Brings New Rhythm to Cultural Tourism

[Photo via Xinhua News Agency]

On October 1, 2026, the first day of China's National Day holiday, Shexiang Ancient Town in Dafang County, Guizhou Province, hosted a unique open-air concert. Dozens of curving terraces carved into a hillside surrounded the venue, and as night fell, more than 10,000 people filled the tiers in light rain, singing as music and bands of light swept across the hillside. Guizhou-born singer Zhou Shen performed alongside other musicians, drawing fans from across the country.

When the ancient town was developed as a relocation community in 2016, earth and rock excavated during construction were used to reshape a low-lying hollow into curved tiers following the natural contours of the hillside. Seen from above, the concentric curves resemble the ridges of a fingerprint, giving the site its name—the "Fingerprint of Earth." The town is now home to more than 12,000 people relocated from different parts of Dafang County. Before becoming a concert venue, the terraces hosted community cultural activities including folk-song performances and traditional Torch Festival celebrations.

The concerts have also brought a sharp rise in visitor numbers. According to local tourism authorities, the town recorded about 756,600 tourist visits between August 1 and October 1, up 154.74 percent year on year. Eight concerts held during this period attracted more than 296,000 visits. On October 1 alone, Dafang recorded about 99,800 tourist visits, while Shexiang Ancient Town received around 58,000 visits, more than six times the figure recorded a year earlier.

The three cases presented here—young artisans, Fuzhou's openness and exchange, and the terraced concert—collectively demonstrate that living cultural transmission requires intergenerational innovation, heritage protection requires openness and inclusiveness, and cultural tourism integration requires community participation. These practices echo the positioning of culture as a driver of development in the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and offer globally relevant Chinese experience for cultural heritage protection and creative economy development.

(Compiled from People's Daily Online, Xinhua News Agency, etc.)