Tangshan’s New Look and Old Charm: The Collision of Tangshan Seven Workshops and Chunxi Dianke

Address: near Xijia, S337 Provincial Road, Jiangning District, Nanjing. Travel time: April 2020. Travel mode: self-driving. I’ve heard of Tangshan Seven Workshops for years, because my workplace's kindergarten often organizes parent-child spring or autumn outings there. Colleagues who went would bring back dried tofu or rice cakes. So I knew it as a place with various handicraft workshops where children and parents can make things together. But I never felt the urge to visit it on its own. After lunch today, not feeling sleepy, I thought about going for a little wander. With only half a day, it wasn’t suitable to go far, so I thought to head to Tangshan—it’s an easy drive. We’ve become quite familiar with Tangshan lately, but then I suddenly remembered the Seven Workshops, a place I’d heard of but never visited. So off I went to see this kindergarten favorite. From our location in Nanjing’s eastern suburbs, a smooth expressway took us just over 20 minutes to Qifang Village on S337.

A tourist map of Tangshan Seven Workshops gave us a rough idea of the layout. At the village entrance, there was a parking lot; we parked and saw a visitor center next to it. Inside the visitor center, there was an introduction to the history of Mengmu Community. There were also displays of folk culture, local products, and souvenirs. The village has a deep cultural heritage and is the birthplace of the historical story of Canglong Temple, a famous monastery in Jiangnan, and Qinglong Bridge.

Leaving the visitor center and heading west, a stone-paved path led up the hill to the tofu workshop, one of the seven. Fallen petals covered the ground—did they give off a kind of lonely beauty? In the large yard in front of the tofu workshop, rows of benches held neat little stone mills. It was easy to imagine that on a normal day, this would be a hands-on tofu-making experience area. The hardworking villagers of Qifang insist on making tofu using the ancestral handmade method: grinding soybeans with stone mills, filtering the dregs through gauze, coagulating with brine... For over 40 years, every step follows tradition, with genuine ingredients. That’s why, they say, the tofu here is rich and fragrant, a big hit with tourists and the golden signboard of the Seven Workshops. But the pandemic had taken its toll—the place was now deserted.

Walking up the stone steps, the stone path midway up the hill became the old lane of the Seven Workshops. A short walk along it brought us to Old Xue’s Sauce Workshop. In the yard, farm tools were scattered seemingly at random, and pink petals added a touch of poetry. Many sauce vats with big hats sat there. For thousands of years, 'jiang' (fermented sauces) have been the foundation of flavor on Chinese tables. Since the Three Kingdoms period, people have used starters to make various soybean pastes, a tradition handed down to this day. Fresh cooked black soybeans, under the action of starter, are soaked, stewed, and fermented, and with time, develop unique flavors and nutritional benefits. A man was tending the sauce workshop, and several varieties of sauce were for sale. From the doorway, I could see the wine workshop below, hung with red lanterns. This was the oil press, fragrant with scent. It’s said that Pan’s Oil Press here still uses the ancestral traditional pressing technique, handmade, selecting fine ingredients without any chemical additives, preserving the natural nutrition and original flavor of the oilseeds. But all the workshops were now quiet and deserted. Yet from their neatness, you could see that once they offered a full tour for visitors to witness traditional food-processing techniques. Here, children could vividly and directly experience how people in ancient Jiangnan processed agricultural products. Both adults and kids could visit the tofu, oil, wine, sauce, vermicelli, popped rice, and cake workshops, try their hand, and have fun. No wonder it’s often the top choice for kindergarten activities.

Due to the pandemic, each workshop was deserted, some without even an owner in sight, so we didn’t spend much time. We just wandered westward along the road without a plan. Unexpectedly, we stumbled upon a beautiful area—buildings terraced along the hillside with distinctive designs. It turned out to be the location of Chunxi Dianke hotel in Tangcheng. This hotel area was so fantastical, like a fairy-tale world. Flowers and grass flourished around the houses. Those round little cuties are fun, aren’t they? A group of rabbits on the green grass reminded me of Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit. A tube of yellow toothpaste squeezed out a stream of colorful flowers, dyeing the green earth into a colorful world.

Among the mountain trees, glass A-frame cabins looked just like fairy-tale cottages. The roads themselves were colorful. These colorful plants were the most important characters of spring. With nature’s power, they lit up this fairy-tale world and awakened our love and longing for life. At first I didn’t believe it; I thought they were flowers, but on closer inspection, these differently colored plants were indeed just foliage. Why can leaves and grasses be so richly hued? Finally I spotted one tiny bloom. The rich foliage and stones encircled the winding path, guiding us into a springtime pastoral scene. The setting lifted my spirits immensely; I often stopped to sit right on a rock and gaze at the abundant plants, utterly delighted, eyes feasting. I felt fortunate to witness such beautiful nature.

Along the colorful road and among the colorful plants, seven glass-and-wood villas nestled on the hillside. A path of wood planks and pebbles led us close to them. Each villa had a lovely name. From the high knoll, you could see Qifang Village below. Every cabin was unique, never the same. A large deck stretched in front of each one. What would it feel like to have such a big villa all to yourself? Lush flowers and grasses surrounded the houses. The rich, harmonious layers were absolutely beautiful. Pink azaleas set the greenery ablaze. The grass looked fine and soft, seemingly fragile, but gathered together it became a 'bouquet'. A wooden boardwalk connected to a suspension bridge. The other end of the bridge led to a treehouse platform built around the growth of the trees—leading us downhill from the mountain while protecting the trees, a clever design. On the swaying bridge, I looked back at the fairy-tale cabins on the hillside. A distinctive covered walkway stood nearby. From the treehouse, the elevated view showed that this area was separate from Qifang Village. A row of colorful pencil-shaped fences enclosed a man-made sand beach. The beach and a little boat created a mood. Looking up from the beach, you could see the bridge and cabins. Beside the beach was a small pond, with a colorful path next to it. A green iron fence along the path separated it from Qifang Village. Poking my camera through the fence, I captured the yellow rapeseed flowers and pale purple broad bean blossoms in the village’s vegetable garden. The pond’s reflection enriched the scenery with more layers. I took a shot of the rippling reflections. Withered lotus in the pond had a forlorn beauty. Glittering dewdrops like big pearls trembled on the lotus leaves. Surprisingly, water lilies had already started blooming this season.

This area wasn’t connected to the village, so we had to backtrack. I really loved this place—it was a feast for the eyes. These seemingly ordinary flowers and plants had turned it into a colorful world. Around the houses, along stone paths, on the hillside, between courtyards, all kinds of plants painted a colorful fairy-tale landscape. Even the leaves came in several shades of red that I couldn’t name exactly. Low walls of rough stone were topped with layers of delicate moss. Under blue sky and white clouds, a colorful windmill spun—everything was so beautiful. From a signboard, I learned about the hotel’s facilities.

Returning to the village, from there I could see the Chunxi Dianke cabins on the hillside by the pond. On one side was a villa cluster with modern design and creativity; on the other, the original rustic village houses and fields of Qifang Village. At the cake workshop, I didn’t see handmade production, but someone was selling rice cakes and other pastries, which looked freshly baked. I bought some as a souvenir of visiting Tangshan Seven Workshops. In the center of the village stood a tree with lush foliage. On the east side, a north-south river named Maxin River was undergoing dredging and cleaning, so the riverbed didn’t look very pretty. Alongside the river ran the village’s main road. Following the clean, tidy lane, I admired the pretty rural houses. On one side, many farmhouses were operating as agritainment restaurants. These quaint eateries were neat and well-kept, wisteria blooming beautifully on a trellis. There was also a fairly large 'Zhiqing Family' place. During the Cultural Revolution’s 'Up to the Mountains, Down to the Villages' movement, 49 educated youth from Nanjing and Zhenjiang came here to live, eat, and work with the locals. Together with villagers, they quarried stones, built piers, poured cement slabs, and after two hard winters and springs, they built a pedestrian bridge over Maxin River—the Zhiqing Bridge. Opening a Zhiqing restaurant here gives those now in their sixties and seventies a place to gather when they return, a lovely thought.

Next to the river, a public activity area had lush vegetation in tiers, several pavilions shaped like farm tools, and fitness equipment. Several bridges spanned the river in a row. First was Qinglong Bridge, built at the end of the Western Han Dynasty, and it serves as Qifang Village’s village bridge. Standing here for over a thousand years still standing, it inspired reverence. Further northeast from Qinglong Bridge was Xinglong Bridge, said to have been first built in the late Eastern Han Dynasty. It was larger. Walking onto Xinglong Bridge, I looked at the village houses; murals on them were rich in rural flavor. The river was being dredged, so it wasn’t very scenic, but from promotional photos displayed in the village, it was clear that when the water was clear and rippling, it looked charming. Both sides of the tidy road were lush with plants, flowers and trees complementing each other, and the village’s living environment had been completely renewed. Buildings stood row upon row, with shady trees and flourishing flowers in every front and back yard. Such a setting lifted one’s spirits. Farmyard guard dogs were real watchdogs; seeing us friendly outsiders, they barked incessantly as if warning us off their territory. Continuing south along the village road, at the southern end of Maxin River stood an old sluice gate, built entirely of stones of various sizes and shapes, exuding a rugged grandeur. Walking onto it, I peered through the gate’s opening at the river. From there, I could see a pavilion in the river in the distance. Along the eastern bank of Maxin River, a long wooden boardwalk over the water served as a health trail for Qifang Village. A path led directly up to S337. The construction vehicles in the parking lot showed that this beautiful village was still under continuous improvement. The southern end of the road was actually another village entrance, with a tall, gable-roofed bus stop where one could catch a bus to nearby villages. There’s even a dedicated scenic bus route that shuttles through Jiangning’s pretty countryside. A catchy 'Song of the Seven Workshops' told the village’s unique story. In the afternoon, I’d visited a characteristic village, drawn by the handmade workshops. But unexpectedly, this rustic Qifang Village neighbored and blended with the modern Chunxi Dianke. Two styles, two features, coexisting and complementing each other beautifully on this land.