Carving new life into Dalian's cultural heritage

The craftsmen create wonderful shell carvings as works of art through design, cutting, bonding, drilling, polishing and many other technical crafts.

In recent years, inspired by the importance of inheriting traditional artforms, local shell sculptors have learned skills from other skilled crafts such as jade carving, wood and stone carving, and improved the shell carving processes, including material selection, rough and fine embryo treatment, manual fine carving, rough grinding, polishing, three-dimensional sculpture and assembly. Through co-learning, new developments have been achieved.

As a coastal city surrounded by sea in three directions, Dalian benefits from a long coastline and rich marine resources. The various resources of shellfish provide a wealth of materials for the development of shell carving skills.