Embroidery Revival Pays off in Rural Hubei County
- Home
- News
- People
- In-depth
- ACWF
Embroidery Revival Pays off in Rural Hubei County
ByLiu Kun and Li Hongyang January 24, 2022A college graduate who longed for a slower life returned from Wuhan to her hometown in Huangmei County, Hubei Province, and started a career based on its rich embroidery tradition.
Hong Li, 35, has trained about 100 rural women in the county to embroider for her workshop, which sells their art across the province.
Huangmei embroidery, a national intangible cultural heritage, was handed down thousands of years ago. The skill uses multicolored silk threads to form patterns of flowers or animals on scarves, clothing, curtains and tents.
In the old days, there was a saying that a good wife in Huangmei had to master the skill. Hong learned it from her mother and grandmother when she was a teenager.
"The embroidery patterns reflect simple life ideals and the aesthetic tastes of ordinary people," she said. "It is increasingly rare and should be treasured as a work of art."
For example, art pieces usually feature fish to express a wish for wealth or a phoenix as an auspicious omen.
After Hong graduated from Hubei University of Technology, she learned other embroidery skills from masters in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, Wuhan, Hubei's provincial capital, and Shanghai.
In May 2020, she founded a company with her partner, selling Huangmei embroidery pieces made by her and other local women.
"I made embroidery my career because I had always longed for a slow-paced life, especially when I saw grannies spending whole mornings doing embroidery at their doors," she said.
"However, stitching is challenging and requires endurance and patience. The fingerprints on two of my fingers have almost been erased due to the work."
Her confidence in the career was boosted when someone who loves the embroidery asked Hong to make tailor-made decorations for an entire house.
Hong's stitching product patterns have grown from 10 to about 100, and her workshop earns about 1 million yuan ($157,800) a year.
Each woman who contributes crafts to her workshop earns at least 2,000 yuan a month. Local women who used to work as migrant workers or were unemployed learn stitching from Hong.
"At first, I chose it out of my desire for a slow life," she said. "But now, I feel obliged to pass it on."
She plans to expand production, but said that is difficult because traditional Huangmei embroidery relies on pure handiwork, which is both a selling point as well as a barrier for growth.
"Pure handiwork is time-consuming and labor-intensive, so we can't increase the output immediately," Hong said.
In addition, some people prefer to buy a machine-made embroidered piece rather than a handmade one though the patterns and quality look similar, as the handmade one would usually cost more. "It is difficult to resist the impact of modern industrial products," she said.
Hong is designing semifinished products that can be put onto a production line. She also plans to establish more training bases and hold creative skills competitions to revive the craft.
(Source: China Daily)
32.3KPlease understand that womenofchina.cn,a non-profit, information-communication website, cannot reach every writer before using articles and images. For copyright issues, please contact us by emailing: [email protected]. The articles published and opinions expressed on this website represent the opinions of writers and are not necessarily shared by womenofchina.cn.
Comments
Magazines
Projects
- 2023 Women Science and Technology Innovation Pioneer...
Photos
- People Enjoy Blooming Tulips in Jinan, East...
- Flowers Bloom Across China in Spring
Special Coverage
Related articles
Bella Hadid goes braless in a thigh
She is one of America's most recognisable fashion models.And Bella Hadid continued to show why she i2024-05-21Leverkusen again rescue unbeaten run with late draw
Bayer Leverkusen left it late once again and secured a 2-2 draw with Stuttgart thanks to Robert Andr2024-05-21Beijing launches annual 'reading season'
The city of Beijing kicked off its 14th annual "reading season" on Monday, with nearly 3002024-05-21Antiques Roadshow guest shocked by astonishing value of medieval stone head she found in her DRAIN
An Antiques Roadshow guest was left aghast by the value of a medieval stone head she found in her dr2024-05-21Lynn Williams breaks NWSL goal
Lynn Williams scored her 79th league goal, becoming the National Women’s Soccer League all-time scor2024-05-21US GDP growth slows to annual rate of 1.6% in Q1
The U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate slowed down to an annual rate of 1.6 percent in th2024-05-21
atest comment