Zhongshi Garment Making Craftsmanship
01 · Historical Records
The Zhenxingxiang Chinese-style garment-making craft traces its lineage to the Jindefu tailor shop founded in 1897 at Xinmatou (New Wharf) on Baoqing Bridge, Hushu, Hangzhou. After the 1956 public–private joint operation it was renamed the "Limin Chinese-Style Garment Supply-and-Marketing Production Cooperative," and the name Zhenxingxiang has remained in continuous use as the enterprise's trademark to this day.
02 · Core Techniques & Process
The Zhenxingxiang Chinese-style garment craft is a distinctive skill for making traditional Chinese garments entirely by hand. Its superb making techniques form a system of their own, transmitted through several generations down to the present. Over more than a century, Zhenxingxiang has absorbed and carried forward the quintessence of the Chinese nation's millennia of clothing culture, developing distinctive techniques of pronounced Chinese national style: the large front overlap, the stand collar (also called the "Chinese collar"), the one-word button, and the ten hand skills of inlay (xiang), embedding (qian), piping (gun), dang, coiling (pan), nailing (ding), hooking (gou), and embroidery (xiu). The main craft sequence is: style conception, measuring, selecting fabric, cutting, sewing, button-attaching, and final pressing. Using high-grade brocade satin and silk as materials, it hand-cuts and hand-sews a product range including qipao, changshan and magua (long gowns and mandarin jackets), and men's and women's Chinese-style suits. Today Zhenxingxiang designs and makes Chinese-style garments for various occasions for well-known figures from all walks of life at home and abroad, overseas Chinese, and compatriots in Taiwan, reflecting the identification of Chinese people worldwide with Chinese clothing culture. In 2008 it completed the production of the two series of Beijing Olympic award-ceremony dresses, "Blue-and-White Porcelain" and "Pink," fully demonstrating the remarkable charm of the Zhenxingxiang Chinese-style garment craft.
Documented Process Records
The main craft sequence is: style conception, measuring, selecting fabric, cutting, sewing, button-attaching, and final pressing. Using high-grade brocade satin and silk as materials, it hand-cuts and hand-sews a product range including qipao, changshan and magua, and men's and women's Chinese-style suits.
03 · Regional Records & Related Items
The formation of the Zhenxingxiang craft is linked to two wharves: it started at the Jindefu tailor shop at the New Wharf on Baoqing Bridge, and after completing his training Weng Taixiao opened the Zhenxingxiang tailor shop separately at 27 Wushan Road. The trade's hand skills are summed up in mnemonic formulae: beyond the large front-flap, stand collar, and one-character button, there are the ten manual techniques of inlay, embedding, piping, dang, coiling, nailing, hooking, and embroidery; the materials are brocade satin and silk, and the judgment of sizing in five steps relies entirely on the touch of the hand.
Other submitting regions for the same item: Zhongshi Garment Making Craftsmanship · Zhongshi Garment Making Craftsmanship · Zhongshi Garment Making Craftsmanship · Zhongshi Garment Making Craftsmanship · Zhongshi Garment Making Craftsmanship · Zhongshi Garment Making Craftsmanship.
04 · Cultural Value & Contemporary Safeguarding
The inheritor Weng Taixiao studied under Jindefu, and after completing his training opened the Zhenxingxiang tailor shop at 27 Wushan Road, Hangzhou. Bao Wenqi (per the official archived record of the associated inheritor): Male, Han ethnicity, born in September 1951, a native of Dongyang City, Zhejiang Province. Representative inheritor of the fourth batch of national-level intangible cultural heritage: Chinese-Style Garment-Making Craft (Zhenxingxiang Chinese-Style Garment-Making Craft). Chinese-style garment-making technician. From the 1970s to the mid-1980s he worked at the Hangzhou Tianshui Silk Weaving Factory, where he apprenticed to old craftsmen and mastered the production techniques of silk garments, with especially deep study of silk-fabric dyeing and the physical behavior of fabrics in garment production. From the mid-1980s to the early 1990s he was responsible for silk and garment production technology at the Hangzhou Silk Holding Group Corporation. From the early 1990s he headed the production and management of Chinese-style garments at the Hangzhou Limin Chinese-Style Garment Factory, leading the making of the Boao Forum Chinese tunics, the two Olympic award-ceremony dress series "Blue-and-White Porcelain" and "Pink" in 2008, and some twenty sets of high-grade ceremonial dresses such as the old and new "Ten Scenes of West Lake," winning wide praise. At the same time, he has devoted himself to researching and developing new techniques, promoting the development of the traditional craft on the basis of its complete preservation.
05 · Associated Representative Bearers
Representative bearers recorded under this item, organized by national nomination batch:
- Xu Yongliang 04-1921
- Lin Ruixiang 04-1922
- Bao Wenqi 04-1923
- Chen Yuqiu
06 · Authoritative Sources & Bibliography
Sources
China Intangible Cultural Heritage Network (ihchina.cn)
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