Dongming’s ingenuous folk crafts — blue printed cloth

Blue printed cloth is a traditional Chinese printing and dyeing technique. Dongming’s blue printed cloth folk art, a traditional hand-dyeing technique, dates back hundreds of years. It is a provincial intangible cultural heritage of Shandong Province.

Creating Dongming’s blue printed cloth involves a very complicated production process, including pattern making, anti-dyeing production, and the printing and dyeing processes. In finished works, white designs are clearly visible on the distinctive blue background. The designs are generally flowers, birds, insects and animals, which all have auspicious meanings. These patterns are exquisite in shape, rich in form, propitious in meaning, and unique in style. Patterns such as phoenix and peony, unicorn sending children (fertility), and festivity and abundance are all expressions of simplicity, elegance, freshness and peaceful beauty.

Chen Xusheng, the current inheritor of blue printed cloth in Dongming County, has recently developed and produced a series of new products using blue printed cloth as the raw material after improving the platemaking for blue printed cloth printing and dyeing processes. His products are widely welcomed in Chinese and overseas markets.

Source: Information Office of Dongming County People’s Government