Inspiring love for embroidered tiger-head shoemaking artistry

Before dawn broke on a mid-June day in Songyuan, Jilin province, Yu Yanbo left her village carrying bags of handmade tiger-head shoes and other supplies. She was headed to Changchun, the provincial capital, where she would do something she had never imagined: teach a class at Jilin University.

Yu is a fourth-generation inheritor of the craft of tiger-head shoemaking in the Qian Gorlos Mongolian autonomous county, or Qianguo county, Songyuan. She began learning the art of embroidering the traditional shoe from her mother at age 11 and by the following year, she could independently complete the entire shoemaking process. Yu currently runs a workshop, where she teaches anyone interested in the craft.

As the train carried her toward Changchun back in June, Yu kept nervously folding and unfolding a few sheets of handwritten notes outlining the lecture she had prepared for the university's master's and doctoral students, attempting to calm her nerves. For a village embroiderer accustomed to working in her small workshop, the idea of standing before graduate students at one of China's leading universities was both a wonderful opportunity and a daunting challenge.

Yu was not going to the university to simply teach students how to make tiger-head shoes. She hoped to find a new generation willing to carry the traditional craft forward and, ultimately, a way to make it sustainable. "My maternal great-grandmother came from a family with a long tradition of embroidery. The craft was passed down to me, and I was determined that it should never be lost in my generation," Yu said. "Without young people to carry on the skills and a viable way to make a living from them, it could eventually disappear."

In 2024, Yu was named one of the country's first rural master craftspeople. Her tiger-head shoes also received a national patent and a registered trademark.

That year and the next, she took part in a training program for rural industry pioneers in Jilin, where she encountered new ideas and broader perspectives. During one session, she met Tang Wenting, a teacher at Jilin University's Research Institute of Rural Revitalization, and shared her wish to bring the craft into universities and connect with young people interested in tiger-head shoes.

Her wish soon became reality. Yu was invited by the university to give a lecture on intangible cultural heritage to graduate students at the School of Archaeology's department of cultural heritage and museology.

Yu recalled that on the day of the lecture, she was surprised to be welcomed by Hu Weijun, a professor and doctoral supervisor at the university's Art College, who researches traditional crafts, design innovation and the preservation of intangible cultural heritage.

At lunchtime, Hu told her that bringing traditional skills into university classrooms was not only in line with national policy, but also something students needed. His words eased her nerves before she stepped up to the podium.

During the lecture, Yu recalled, she brought out two pairs of tiger-head shoes — one handmade and the other machine-made — and led students in a discussion on the differences between the two techniques. She also explored the cultural significance of tiger-head shoes and their potential for development from the perspective of cultural and creative industries. The three-hour class also included a hands-on session, during which Yu taught the students how to make pomegranate-shaped embroidered sachets. Yu said the students' knowledge of intangible cultural heritage and fresh perspectives on innovation inspired her.

One of the students said intangible cultural heritage should be rooted in rural culture in Jilin and brought to life through hands-on learning so it can thrive in the modern world, rather than being preserved solely as a traditional craft, Yu said.

For Yu, the journey from a small village workshop to a university lecture hall was only the beginning.

The class experience gave Yu fresh ideas on how to keep the craft alive beyond the classroom. She began thinking about how it could reach a wider audience and develop a sustainable path to the market.

Hu was thinking along similar lines. At the end of July, he and Tang drove to Yu's workshop to explore how the tiger-head shoemaking craft could be developed into a study program that would give more people the chance to learn the craft through hands-on experience.