Rong • Sǔn Mǎo Design Exhibition

Rong in Chinese means “melting”, which means that instead of simply putting traditional crafts and contemporary design together, we preferred to deeply understand what composed of Chinese handcrafts first and then “melting” them into contemporary design. Rong design exhibition takes 5-years research plan as a pattern. For the first 5-years we focused on 5 traditional Chinese materials in each year: bamboo, silk, mud, copper and paper. This is our sixth year, Sǔn Mǎo is the subject what we would like to research. Sǔn Mǎo, which is Chinese Joints, is a traditional Chinese method(and tools as well) for connecting things. This technique can be applied to big structures in construction field, such as buildings and bridges, and also to the small object like furniture and windows. The wood joints which were used to complete a three-dimensional structure for constructions by ancient Chinese craftsmen had an extremely high requirement about the quality of the wood. Along with the hardwood materials gradually faded, in which direction Sǔn Mǎo – based design should go has become an interesting topic for our researchers and designers.

Rong in Chinese means “melting”, which means that instead of simply putting traditional crafts and
contemporary design together, we preferred to deeply understand what composed of Chinese
handcrafts first and then “melting” them into contemporary design. Rong design exhibition takes
5-years research plan as a pattern. For the first 5-years we focused on 5 traditional Chinese
materials in each year: bamboo, silk, mud, copper and paper. This is our sixth year, Sǔn Mǎo is the
subject what we would like to research.
Sǔn Mǎo, which is Chinese Joints, is a traditional Chinese method(and tools as well) for connecting
things. This technique can be applied to big structures in construction field, such as buildings and
bridges, and also to the small object like furniture and windows. The wood joints which were used to
complete a three-dimensional structure for constructions by ancient Chinese craftsmen had an
extremely high requirement about the quality of the wood. Along with the hardwood materials
gradually faded, in which direction Sǔn Mǎo – based design should go has become an interesting
topic for our researchers and designers.

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2019
Grantee: Huang Xinchen
Organisation: Hangzhou Yuhang Rong Contemporary Art and Design Center (Rong Design Library)

As a non-profit organization, Rong Design Library is the first traditional handicraft material library in China. The core missions are deconstructing the traditional Chinese handicraft into materials and technology, providing the material research results to designers and artists all over the world, and encouraging them to implement deconstruction thinking when cooperating with traditional handicraft workshops. Eventually, the things we have done will promote the inheritance of traditional culture and the progress of contemporary design.