Horsetail and silk thread are intertwined with each other to draw a beautiful outline on the cloth surface. Colorful embroidery threads are skillfully filled in, and three-dimensional color patterns with relief texture emerge between the flying needles and threads... At the Intangible Cultural Heritage Project Experience Center in Sandu Shui Autonomous County, Guizhou Province, the scene of horse tail embroidery of Shui nationality, which is produced by Yang Mei, a non hereditary successor of Shui nationality, was recently published by Taiwan's "Mainland Wonder Finding" The camera team recorded the scene.

On May 21, the production team of Taiwan's "Mainland Wonders" filmed the production of horsetail embroidery in Sandu Shui Autonomous County, Guizhou Province. Photographed by Zhang Hongyan

"This time I came here to shoot horsetail embroidery in admiration of the fame, hoping to let more Taiwan audiences know about this skill and feel the unique charm of the Shui culture," said Lai Xuanfu, director of Taiwan's "Mainland Wonder".

Horsetail embroidery is an embroidery technique that uses horse hair as the raw material of embroidery thread. Because of its long history, it is known as the "living fossil" of embroidery and was included in China's first batch of national intangible cultural heritage lists in 2006.

During the embroidery gap, Yang Mei introduced that the traditional horsetail embroidery mainly uses red and green colors, but modern young people prefer simple and fashionable designs, so they made improvements in patterns and colors. At the same time, they learned from the embroidery method of Miao Embroidery, cut raw materials of different colors into the desired patterns, and then fixed them on the embroidery cloth with silk threads. The works embroidered in this way have a more modern aesthetic feeling.

Horsetail embroidery works exhibited by the Intangible Cultural Heritage Project Experience Center of Sandu Shui Autonomous County, Guizhou Province. Photographed by Zhang Hongyan

In the Intangible Cultural Heritage Project Experience Center of Sandu Shui Autonomous County, there are not only traditional shoulder straps, embroidered shoes and other folk collections, but also simple and modern framed embroidery pieces and fashion. Here, tourists can experience the production skills of horsetail embroidery, so it has become a "clocking place" for many tourists.

Horsetail embroidery, an ancient skill that has been passed down for thousands of years, is also popular with overseas customers. In 2019, Yang Mei's company received an order for French dresses embroidered on silk fabrics, which is a huge challenge for her, who is used to embroidering on stiff homespun fabrics. After discussion and repeated experiments with the embroiderers, they put the lining cloth under the silk. After repeated experiments and exploration, they finally embroidered exquisite patterns on the silk fabric.

Since then, Yang Mei's company has also undertaken some high-end customized orders in Europe, such as horsetail embroidery collars, dresses and leather bags, thus starting the "high definition" of horsetail embroidery.

"We will send aquarium characters and horsetail embroidery patterns to overseas designers, who will combine these elements according to the unique attributes of the product, target user groups and current fashion trends to create a high-end clothing series that is both traditional and modern," Yang said.

At present, a French company is negotiating a customized project of horsetail embroidery notebook.

Wei Xiuxun, chairman of the Women's Federation of Sandu Shui Autonomous County, introduced that Sandu has a wide range of horsetail embroidery products, including horsetail embroidery+batik, horsetail embroidery+Miao embroidery, horsetail embroidery+Buyi native cloth and other combinations. These products are not only popular with domestic consumers, but also exported to France, Dubai and other places.

In Sandu Shui Autonomous County, horsetail embroidery is quietly emerging, which has not only become the "darling" of the fashion circle, but also an important pillar of local rural revitalization. At present, there are more than 200 enterprises and self-employed households engaged in the management of national culture, such as horsetail embroidery and batik, with an annual output value of 40 million yuan, driving more than 30000 people to gain employment and income. (Zhang Hongyan)

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