Vlogger masters traditional crafts, helps drive rural development in SW China's Sichuan

Yan Hong, a vlogger with millions of followers from Chengdu, southwest China's Sichuan Province, has made herself a craftswoman of traditional aesthetics, inspiring more and more young people to fall in love with these crafts.

Born in 1989 and trained as a nurse at North Sichuan Medical College, she spent five years studying a profession that never quite captured her heart. After working as a nurse in Chengdu for two years, she decided to follow her true calling: creative work.

With a flair for design and nimble hands to match, she enrolled in a makeup course and started out as a bridal makeup artist. In her spare time, she designed custom hair accessories tailored to each bride's features, and her work quickly won her a devoted clientele.

Her journey as a craft vlogger began with a single velvet flower.

"In 2018, a period drama was airing and everyone was talking about the velvet flower hairpieces the characters wore," Yan recalled. "I thought I'd try recreating one with chenille stems — and it actually worked. So I uploaded the process to the popular video-sharing site Bilibili."

Photo shows a belt crafted by Yan Hong using welding and collage techniques, made from copper and alloy. (Photo/He Qiang)

Unexpectedly, her very first video drew an outpouring of praise.

From there, her projects grew ever more ambitious. Drawing on a mobile game's depictions of Peking Opera costumes, she spent nearly 200 hours crafting a phoenix crown from 18 ring-pull cans.

For another project, she hand-dyed 3,000 nutshells a gleaming electroplated gold and glued them one by one onto an armor template. In yet another, she used copper sheeting and paper-cutting techniques to transform a popular illustrator's "half-face makeup" artwork into a vivid golden phoenix poised for flight.

These creations drew a growing audience, but a comment in her feed brought an unexpected turning point.

"A viewer once told me my filigree inlay work wasn't authentic," Yan said. She had been teaching herself entirely through trial and error, and only after the viewer mentioned the traditional silver filigree craft did she realize how much more there was to learn.

Determined to do it properly, she set out to find a master. When she posted a half-finished piece online, fans pointed her to Ni Chengyu, a leading inheritor of the Chengdu silver filigree craft.

Ni was 79 at the time, long retired, and had no interest in taking on new students. Yan visited repeatedly, each time bringing her work. It was her sheer devotion to the craft that finally won Ni over. In May 2021, Yan formally became her apprentice.

To carry the tradition forward, Yan established a team dedicated to silver filigree in 2023. That same year, 23-year-old Zhang Yuejun made his way from south China's Guangdong Province to join her.

The seven-member team also includes Hu Weibing, another recognized inheritor of the Chengdu silver filigree craft, now in her 70s.

"A lot of our pieces are finished under Hu's guidance. Take this coreless vase — I still haven't mastered it. Only she can pull it off," Yan said.

Photo shows a filigree butterfly-and-peony crown crafted by Yan Hong using the Chengdu silver filigree craft. (Photo/He Qiang)

Yan has combined the craft with elements that resonate with younger audiences, giving rise to a wealth of new designs, including her "half-face makeup" headdresses.

Through a combination of online and offline channels, Yan has turned her artistry into a viable business. He Qiang, her team's photographer and business manager, said the team has adapted to suit the way modern audiences watch content. Videos that once ran over 10 minutes have been trimmed to around two, and the format has shifted from step-by-step technical documentation to narrative storytelling — faster-paced, more shareable, yet no less rigorous.

In recent years, Yan has been thinking about how silver filigree can find a place in everyday life. In her view, the only way to bring the craft into daily use is to strike the right balance between tradition and modernity — transforming silver filigree from something people admire behind glass into something they can actually use and wear.

Today, her silver filigree catalog has grown to dozens of products, available both online and in stores, and all proving a hit with customers.

In Sandaoyan town, Pidu district, Chengdu, Yan runs a traditional crafts studio. The ground floor houses around 300 handmade accessories she has created; upstairs is where her team works.

To help drive rural development, in 2025 Yan turned an intangible cultural heritage museum just a few hundred meters from her studio into a multipurpose cultural space combining exhibitions, hands-on experiences and creative product development.

Dozens of intangible cultural heritage items are on display, including filigree inlay, mineral pigment painting, paper-cutting and Shu embroidery, while courses in mother-of-pearl inlay, paper-cutting and bamboo weaving are already up and running.

"Since we opened last October, more than a thousand people have come to visit," He said.

The museum has also given young people from nearby Gucheng village a new place to work. Drawn in by Yan's growing reputation, the museum has attracted a steady flow of visitors, students and young villagers who come to learn bamboo weaving or try their hand at silver filigree.

The village, once quiet, has begun to hum with activity. Yan has also helped local residents sell handmade birdcages.

Looking ahead, Yan plans to collaborate with Chengdu Film and Television City to develop simple hair accessories that villagers can make by themselves.

"The more orders come in, the more villagers we can get involved — and the more people who can live a better life through silver filigree," Yan said.