Threads of the Miao

THREADS OF THE MIAO

towards a future of regalia, identity and cultural continuity

Libao (Denny) Wang Graduate Project 2026

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THREADS OF THE MIAO

towards a future of regalia, identity and cultural continuity

Libao (Denny) Wang Bachelor of Environmental Design University of Manitoba, 2023

Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Architecture’ in The Faculty of Graduate Studies, School of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, Architecture Program

Committee Members Rana Abughannam Young-Tack Oh Fuyubi Nakamura

The University of British Columbia May 2026 © Libao Wang

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abstract

This thesis explores Miao garment making in Xijiang Miao Village in Guizhou, China as a living practice. For the Miao people, garments have long served as a primary means of recording history, beliefs, and social relationships through practices of weaving, dyeing, embroidering, and silversmithing, as well as through wearing and inheritance. These practices were traditionally supported by domestic and communal spatial arrangements that allowed knowledge to be learned through proximity, repetition, and shared time. Contemporary patterns of migration, tourism, and rural transformation have altered these conditions and weakened intergenerational transmission, while institutional frameworks of museum display, intangible cultural heritage designation, and tourism have expanded the visibility of the practice without sustaining the embodied conditions through which it continues. In response, the project develops a speculative narrative set in 2075 that imagines a community-led apprenticeship residency in Xijiang Miao Village organized around the Miao agricultural calendar and the sequential processes of garment-making. Through this narrative framework, the thesis examines how cultural continuity might be sustained through embodied learning, collective participation, and shared knowledge, proposing the Miao garment not as a preserved artifact but as a living practice carried forward across generations.

[front page]: Miao People Activities

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table of content

FRONT MATTER

Abstract Table of context List of Figures A Note from The Author

INTRODUCTION CULTURAL THREAD

THE LIFE OF MIAO GARMENT

ii iv vi ix 03

1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4

The Miao Garment Symbolism and Identity Rituals and Festivals Intergenerational Significance

04 06 08 10

2.1 The Rhythm of Making

12

2.2 2.3 2.4 2.5

13 16 16 14

Weaving Dyeing and Calendering Embroidering Sliversmithing

2.6 Wearing 2.7 Inheriting

20 24

3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4

Xijiang Village Cultural Terrain Spatial and Cultural Vulnerabilities

30 32 34 36

INSTITUTIONAL THREAD

4.1 The Garment as Artifact 4.2 The Garment as Cultural Heritage 4.3 The Garment as Tourist Expression

39 42 44

FUTURE THREAD

5.1 The Phone Call with Asha 5.2 Learning Diaries

48 51

SPATIAL THREAD

Domestic Craft Spaces Communal and Ritual Spaces

CONCLUSION END MATTER

71 Bibliography

76

Appendix

80

iv

v

list of figures

cover

Threads of the Miao

front page

Miao People Activities

figure 1

Miao Women Reeling Threads

figure 2

Miao Migration Mapping

figure 3

Butterfly Mother Symbol, Digital Drawing, 2025

figure 4

Bird Symbol, Digital Drawing, 2025

figure 5

Dragon Symbol, Digital Drawing, 2025

figure 6

Miao People Playing Lusheng

figure 7

Miao Teaching Moment

figure 8

Miao Seasonal Agriculture Cycle Diagram and Garmentmaking Cycle

Arthor, Multi-Media, April 2026 Author Altered. Fangting, Active 1784, Zhuan Hui, and Chinese Rare Book Collection. Miao Man tu ce ye: bu fen juan. Manuscript/Mixed Material. Library of Congress. https://www.loc.gov/item/2014514069/.

Author Altered. Fangting, Active 1784, Zhuan Hui, and Chinese Rare Book Collection. Miao Man tu ce ye: bu fen juan. Manuscript/Mixed Material. Library of Congress. https://www.loc.gov/item/2014514069/.

Arthor, Digital Media, April 2026 Author, Digital Media, April 2026 Author, Digital Media, April 2026 Author, Digital Media, April 2026

Author Altered. Fangting, Active 1784, Zhuan Hui, and Chinese Rare Book Collection. Miao Man tu ce ye: bu fen juan. Manuscript/Mixed Material. Library of Congress. https://www.loc.gov/item/2014514069/.

Author Altered. Fangting, Active 1784, Zhuan Hui, and Chinese Rare Book Collection. Miao Man tu ce ye: bu fen juan. Manuscript/Mixed Material. Library of Congress. https://www.loc.gov/item/2014514069/.

Author, Digital Media, April 2026

figure 9

Silkworm Feeding Process

figure 10

Material Sourcing Process

Author, Multi Media, March 2026 Author, Multi Media, March 2026

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figure 11

Textile Weaving Process

figure 12

Embroidering Process

figure 13

Silk Reeling Process

figure 14

Colour Dyeing Process

figure 15

The life of the Miao Illustration

figure 16

Miao Stilted Architecture in Xijiang Village

figure 17

Miao Architecture on Flat Ground Section Drawing

figure 18

Miao Architecture on Slope Section Drawing

figure 19

Miao Architecture Floor Plan Second Floor

figure 20

Miao Architecture Floor Plan First Floor

figure 21

The Map of Guizhou Province

figure 22

The Map of Xijiang Village

figure 23

Museum Linear Learning Diagram

figure 24

Embodied Garment-making Learning Diagram

figure 25

National Cultural Heritage

figure 26

Xijiang Village Tourism Diagram

figure 27

Contemporary Xijiang Village

figure 28

Feeding Silkworms in Spring

figure 29

Planting Dye Flowers in Spring

figure 30

Planting Hemp and Cotton in Spring

figure 31

Learning Annotation Spring Session in Week 1

figure 32

Learning Annotation Spring Session in Week 2

figure 33

Learning Annotation Spring Session in Week 3-4

figure 34

Planting Dye flowers in Dye Garden Spring Session

figure 35

Learning Annotation Spring Session in Week 2

Author, Multi Media, March 2026 Author, Multi Media, March 2026 Author, Multi Media, March 2026 Author, Multi Media, March 2026 Author, Digital Media, October 2025

“Terrace and house of Xijiang Miao Village (Tribe)” by Randomix is, Photography, Accessed April 28, 2026, Openverse, Licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

Author, Digital Media, Dec 2025 Author, Digital Media, Dec 2025 Author, Digital Media, Dec 2025 Author, Digital Media, Dec 2025 Author, Digital Media, Dec 2025 Author, Digital Media, Dec 2025 Author, Digital Media, Dec 2025 Author, Digital Media, Dec 2025

Author, Digital Media, March 2026 Author, Digital Media, March 2026

“Xijiang Thousand Family Miao Village”, Guizhou Province, China. Photograph by Popolon, 2014. Wikimedia Commons. Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Wikimedia Commons.

Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026

figure 36

Making Natural Dye in Commual Space Summer Session

figure 37

Learning Annotation summer Session in Week 7-8

figure 38

Shredding Hemp in Summer

figure 39

Reeling Silk in Summer

figure 40

Dyeing Threads in Summer

figure 41

Learning Annotation Summer Session in Week 5

figure 42

Learning Annotation Summer Session in Week 6

figure 43

Learning Annotation Summer Session in Week 7

figure 44

Dinner With the Miao Families in Summer Session

figure 45

Weaving Textile in Autumn Session

figure 46

Learning Annotation Autumn Session in Week 9

figure 47

Miao New Year Festival in Autumn Session

figure 48

Weaving Class in Autumn Session

figure 49

Learning Annotation Autumn Session in Week 7-8

figure 50

Embroidery Class in Winter Session

figure 51

Learning Annotation Winter Session in Week 14

figure 52

Embroidery Pattern Making in Winter Session

figure 53

Embroidery Class in Winter Session

figure 54

Garment Tailoring in Winter Session

figure 55

Learning Annotation Winter Session in Week 13

figure 56

Learning Annotation Winter Session in Week 14

figure 57

Learning Annotation Winter Session in Week 16

figure 58

Front of the Garment

figure 59

Back of the Garment

figure 60

Full Learning Annotation of the Garment

figure 61

Full Learning Annotation of the Garment 2

Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026 Author, Multil Media, March 2026

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a note from the author

This thesis engages with the living culture, knowledge, and traditions of the Indigenous Miao people of Southwest China. The stories, practices, and meanings recorded in these pages belong to their community and have been carried across generations through embodied practice rather than written record.

Because this work is written within an English-speaking academic context, certain concepts, terms, and cultural references have been translated or, at times, simplified in order to be communicated across languages. These translations represent my best effort to convey meaning, but I recognize that no translation can fully hold the depth of the original. I have approached this subject with deep respect and gratitude, and with an awareness of the responsibilities that come with writing about a culture that is not my own.

This thesis is dedicated to the Miao community of Southwest China, whose culture continues to inspire, weave, and flourish.

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Thank you to the Miao community for the garments, stories, and culture that have shaped this work, and for the generations of knowledge that made this thesis possible.

Thank you to my chair, Rana, for the guidance, patience, and thoughtful conversations that carried this project forward.

Thank you to my committee members, Young-Tack and Fuyubi, for your time and the insightful feedback that strengthened this work.

Thank you to my parents for your constant love and unconditional support.

Thank you to all my friends — Dorothy, Abbie, Alexa, Bridgette, Emma, Robin, Greg, and Jonny — for the encouragement, laughter, and care along the way.

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introduction

Nestled in the misty mountains of Southwest China, the Miao people, one of many ethnic groups rooted in this region, thread imaginations, stories and time into their garments. For thousands of years, the Miao garment has existed as a living visual art and cultural archive inscribed with Miao cosmology and beliefs.1 In the absence of a written language, Miao garments became a primary medium for illustrating history, identity, and collective knowledge across generations.2 Although it is often suggested that the origins of the Miao people are “lost in the mists of time” due to centuries of migration, their garments, rituals, and stories disclose a vividly enduring heritage.3 Today, however, the modernization of rural China and urban migration have disrupted the environments that once sustained these practices.4 As younger generations migrate out of rural villages intergenerational transmission becomes increasingly fragmented, leaving many older practitioners without successors onto whom they can pass down craft knowledge and cultural practices.5 With these movement patterns as well as the influx of tourism, domestic and communal craft spaces have altered the relationship between a Miao garment and the spatial and social conditions that once sustained its cultural significance.6 In response to these conditions, contemporary institutions have moved to safeguard Miao garments through museum display, intangible cultural heritage designation, and tourism. Each offers a form of preservation, and each has expanded the visibility of the practice within China and beyond.7 Threads of the Miao approaches Miao garments as not merely objects to be exhibited in a museum or preserved by institutional systems, but as living systems of making, knowledge transmission, and narrative. Through a speculative narrative framework, the project examines how cultural continuity is sustained through embodied learning, collective participation, and shared knowledge.

[figure 1]: Miao Women Reeling Threads

1. Gina Corrigan, Miao Textiles from China, Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press, 2001, p.9.

2. Karen E. Brock et al., Every Thread a Story: & the Secret Language of Miao Embroidery: Traditional Chinese Artisans of Guizhou Province (Loveland, CO: Thrums Books, 2020), p.284.

3. Yaohua Lin, Fumin Zhang, and Theresa M. Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions: Costumes of the Miao of Southwest China and Beyond. New York: China Institute of America, 1987, p.7.

4. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.260.

5. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.265.

6. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.148.

7. Liang Ma, “The Protection and Revitalization of Chinese Miao Embroidery as an Intangible Cultural Heritage,” Art and Design 8, no. 1 (2025), p.1-8.

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chapter 1. CULTURAL THREAD

the miao garment

[figure 2]: Miao Migration Mapping

8. Qing Wu, Hong Peng, and Xianfeng Ai, “Enlightenment of Miao Cultural Art to Modern Design,” in Proceedings of the 2018 4th International Conference on Social Science and Higher Education (ICSSHE 2018) (Atlantis Press, 2018), p.752.

9. Wu et al., “Enlightenment of Miao Cultural Art to Modern Design,” p.752.

10. Ma, “The Protection and Revitalization of Chinese Miao Embroidery,” p.5.

11. Dong Han and Linlin Cong, “Miao Traditional Patterns: The Origins and Design Transformation,” Visual Studies 38, no. 3-4 (2023), p.426.

12. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.4.

13. Shiyang Wang and O. V. Kolosnichenko, “Study of Miao Embroidery: Semiotics of Patterns and Artistic Value,” Art and Design, no. 3 (2024), p.98.

14. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.285.

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A Miao garment stands between past and present, carrying community memories over thousands of years. Miao culture is “neither entirely a farming culture nor a nomadic culture,” but rather something strikingly in-between, shaped by movement, soil, sky, and water.8 Miao garments contain bright colours, patterns, and embroidery, indicating love for life and a deep synergy with nature.9 The embroidery on the garments conveys passion and freedom, with mysterious images created out of silk, gold, and silver threads and each stitch carrying forth history.10 These decorative patterns emerged almost five thousand years ago with the early batik, which was based on the legend of the young warrior Lang Huang who stitched the story of her people’s escape to preserve its memory before writing had been invented.11 This origin situates a garment as not only clothing but also as a cultural and historical document.

Further, these threads have weathered winds of change. Han assimilation and the Cultural Revolution were periods of great disruption and loss characterized by centuries of conflict and forced migration.12 Today, modernization, urbanization, and tourism continue to alter the meanings of Miao garments. As art critics Wang and Kolosnichenko emphasize, the cultural ecology has changed under market forces leading to a “decline in appreciation” and weakening the transmission of cultural heritage.13 Even so, the garment has survived and adapted while maintaining a muted strength, and so its threads remain unbroken.

ca. 26th century BCE

BATTLE OF ZHUOLU

Battle of Zhuolu Defeat of Chi You Zhuolu area, near the Yellow River (Central Plains) Mythic narrative placing Miao ancestors in the Central Plains and linking origin to early displacement southward.

ca. 2000–221 BCE (Xia–Zhou to pre-Qin formation)

ZHONGYUAN REGION

china

Rise of the Central Plains Core Early state formation in the Yellow River basin Zhongyuan (middle Yellow River, Henan region) Following early conflicts, the Central Plains consolidated into the political and cultural core of emerging dynasties, expanding outward over time.

ca. 2000–771 BCE

SAN MIAO KINGDOM

Appearance of San Miao Kingdom Yangtze basin (Hunan–Hubei region) Groups identified as “San Miao” appear in early records as southern frontier populations outside the expanding Central Plains authority.

NANZHAO KINGDOM

Han–Tang dynasty (206 BCE–907 CE) myanmar

Frontier Incorporation Expansion into southern territories Yangtze basin to Southwest China

vietnam

As imperial power extended southward, upland Miao communities relocated further into mountainous regions.

thailand

philippines

laos

Ming dynasty (14-17 Century) Ming Frontier Militarization Guizhou Mountain Region State penetration into upland regions intensified social pressure and relocation.

cambodia

Qing dynasty (18th Century)

indonesia

MIAO-HMONG MIGRATION TIMELINE

malaysia

Miao Rebellions Under Qing’s Rule Miao Uprisings Guizhou–Hunan borderlands Military suppression caused village destruction and deeper mountain retreat.

Late 18th–19th centuries Cross-Border Migration Transnational Highland Movement Vietnam, Laos, Thailand Some Hmong-speaking groups migrated beyond China’s borders into Southeast Asia.

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symbolism and identity Between the layers of a Miao garment, different symbolisms trace a cosmological understanding of the universe. Miao symbols articulate the laws of nature and the rhythms of life and are thus translated into visual form.14 For example, some patterns reflect clan identity and ideals of beauty while also serving as expressions of artistry and cultural continuity.15 Through careful repetition and variation, these symbols allow garments to function as bearers of shared meaning rather than isolated decorations.

15. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.291.

16. Wang and Kolosnichenko, “Study of Miao Embroidery,” p.102.

17. Wang and Kolosnichenko, “Study of Miao Embroidery,” p.102.

18. Wang and Kolosnichenko, “Study of Miao Embroidery,” p.102.

19. Wang and Kolosnichenko, “Study of Miao Embroidery,” p.102.

20. Wang and Kolosnichenko, “Study of Miao Embroidery,” p.104.

21. Wang and Kolosnichenko, “Study of Miao Embroidery,” p.104.

22. Wang and Kolosnichenko, “Study of Miao Embroidery,” p.106.

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Many cosmological creatures, including the dragon, the bird, and the butterfly appear repeatedly across Miao garments, anchoring them in ancient mythologies. One of the most prominent symbols is the dragon, which is often rendered through coiling forms while rhythmic repetition connects the human body to larger elemental systems of water, land, and movement.16 The dragon is understood as a guardian figure associated with protection, vitality, and the regulation of natural forces, ensuring safety and prosperity for both the individual and the community.17 The bird occupies a central place in Miao garments as a symbol of ancestry and guidance, representing the Miao people’s ancestors and serving as a messenger that delivers souls back to their origins.18 Embroidered bird motifs also bear associations with generative power, reflecting an interwoven system of bird totemism, ancestor worship, and the continuation of lineage.19 The butterfly holds particular significance as an origin figure, most notably through the myth of Butterfly Mother. The butterfly, commonly depicted alongside the maple tree, is regarded in Miao belief as a progenitor of all living things.20 This pairing expresses belief in fertility and allows embroidery to act as a visual carrier of creation stories and ancestral memory.21 These symbols reveal a worldview that accepts life and death as a circular journey: “a journey back to the origins of life.”22 Through these symbols, the garment unfolds as a spiritual map of memory, each one forming a thread that quietly binds people, place, and cosmos across time.

[figure 3]: Butterfly Mother Symbol [figure 4]: Birds Symbol [figure 5]: Dragon Symbol

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rituals and festivals Miao garments come fully into life through ritual and festival, with these events activating the garment beyond the body and drawing it into collective movement, sound, and time. Seasonal celebrations and festivals structure the temporal rhythm through which garments are worn, read, and renewed within the community.

The Spring Festival marks the arrival of the new year through days of feasting, dancing, and fireworks while the Sisters’ Meal Festival gathers hundreds of young women dressed in embroidered garments and silver ornaments in acts of courtship and communal recognition.23 The Lusheng Festival centers on reed pipe music and dance, where sound, movement, dress, and courtship come together through shared ritual practice.24 Similarly, the Bridge Worshipping Festival unites villages through offerings of food, incense, and rice wine.25 Dance and communal feasting then extend these gestures into collective celebration.26 The straight-stitch embroidery worn during festivals requires long hours of labour and reflects a commitment to craft inseparable from ritual participation.27 During the Tiaohua Festival, young men and women assemble on hillsides wearing embroidered rear panels that function as unspoken songs, through which skill and identity are read on cloth.28 Each stitch contributes to a shared rhythm, synchronizing individual effort with collective presence. [figure 6]: Miao People Playing Lusheng

23. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.15.

24. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.15.

25. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.15.

26. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.15.

27. Hsin-Ying Cho, “The Language of Miao Embroidery: Exploring the Traditional ‘Embroidered Rear Skirt Panels’ Worn by the Miao Women of the Huawu Village,” Textile 21, no. 1 (2023), p.6.

28. Cho, “The Language of Miao Embroidery,” p.6.

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Some rituals carry particular weight across generations. The Drum Hiding Festival, which occurs every thirteen years, brings home even those who have left.29 It draws all community members back to their roots with ancestral worship, music, and the glamorous silver ornamentation.30 Other festivities including bullfighting, long table feasts, and the performing of ancient songs further reinforce communal memory and continuity.31 Through these ritual moments, garments remain connected to the practices of gathering, movement, and exchange that give them social presence.

29. Jin-Bo Jiang, Xi Cai, and Hong-Mei Yin, “Research on the Local Reconstruction of Intangible Cultural Heritage in Ethnic Tourism Villages: A Case of Miao Silver Ornaments in Xijiang Miao Village,” SAGE Open 15 (2025), p.7.

30. Jiang, Cai and Yin, “A Case of Miao Silver Ornaments in Xijiang Miao Village,” p.7.

31. Xiao Qiong, “Traditional Culture Preservation in Chinese Ethnic Tourism Community – La préservation de la culture traditionnelle dans le tourisme communautaire ethnique chinois.” Études caribéennes 31/32 (Août–Décembre 2015), p. 122.

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intergenerational significance

[figure 7]: Miao Teaching Moment

32. Ma, “The Protection and Revitalization of Chinese Miao Embroidery,” p. 5.

33. Qiong, “Traditional Culture Preservation in Chinese Ethnic Tourism Community,” p.126.

34. Qiong, “Traditional Culture Preservation in Chinese Ethnic Tourism Community,” p.126.

35. Ma, “The Protection and Revitalization of Chinese Miao Embroidery,” p. 6.

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The Miao garment is an heirloom handed down through hands, heart, and time. Miao history, given the absence of written records, was transmitted over time through embroidery. Women stitched myths, nature, and everyday experience into garments for their children, with history carried through wear rather than written record.32 The teaching of Miao garment-making was anchored within family life. In traditional Miao villages, three or four generations often lived together, creating conditions in which children learned language, ritual, and craft through observation and repetition.33 Knowledge passed slowly from elders to younger hands through shared time, observation, and proximity rather than formal instruction.34 Garments held shared memory, from personal growth to intergenerational bonds within the household.

Contemporary pressures have disrupted these patterns yet practices of transmission continue to adapt. Training initiatives such as the Jinxiu Project support the preservation of embroidery skills and provide opportunities for women to sustain craft practices within changing social conditions.35 Across generations, garments still operate as a bridge connecting individuals to ancestors, land, and community through the continuity of making.

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chapter 2. THE LIFE OF THE MIAO GARMENT

the rhythm of making In the river valleys of southeast Guizhou, “People amble home from fieldwork, water buffalo in tow; people harvest indigo and tend dye vats; women embroider the voices of their ancestors onto handwoven cloth.”36 The life of a Miao garment is closely tied to the Miao agricultural calendar. Farming and garment-making are carried out by the same hands and the natural fibres and dyes that compose a garment grow within the same fields and household plots that feed the family. [figure 8]: Miao Seasonal Agriculture Cycle Diagram and Garment-making Cycle (next page)

36. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.31.

37. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.9-10.

38. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.9-10.

39. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.61.

40. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.10.

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Two conditions hold these practices together, the first being the labour of Miao women who tend both the crops and the cloth and whose available time shifts with the demands of the agricultural calendar.37 The second is the seasonality of materials, since indigo, hemp, and the other plants that make a garment possible cannot be gathered outside their growing periods.38 The relationship between agricultural labour and garment-making is described directly by practitioners. Karen Brock reports in the book The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery that embroidery is

historically done in the low agricultural season when a woman’s hands are softest and therefore the thread does not snag, unlike during the busy agricultural season when a woman must help in the fields, and her hands become rough and calloused.39 Fieldwork limits women’s opportunities for garment-making and the pressure of agricultural labour on textile time persists into the present. Brock notes that as young people leave for cities, “many older women in rural Guizhou now must perform a greater quantity of agricultural and household chores, leaving little time to devote to textile making.”40 The Miao dress cooperative in Kaili reports that winter brings the strongest production, when the slack farming season frees women’s time and festivals generate demand for new garments.41 Materials follow their own seasonal logic. For instance, Miao and Dong communities in Guizhou cultivate at least three species of flowering indigo, drawn from generations of botanical knowledge passed down through subsistence farming.42 Indigo is usually harvested in August, when freshly cut leaves and stalks are soaked in barrels of water for several days to ferment.43 The making of cloth thus depends on what can be grown and gathered within a particular range of months and the practices of dyeing, weaving, and embroidery extend outward from these material constraints across the rest of the year.

Across this rhythm, no single step in a garment’s life stands alone.

Women’s labour and the seasons of the land both set the pace, and the slow accumulation of months is part of what gives the finished garment its significance.

weaving The life of a Miao Garment begins with weaving, which silently maps out memory from material sourcing to fibre threads. Before the mid twentieth century, cloth was produced from locally grown hemp that was harvested, stripped, sun-dried, spun by hand or wheel, and boiled before weaving.44 The loom brought together foot treadle and backstrap systems and the control of tension came through movement, balance, and touch.45 Older women commonly wove on looms constructed by older men in Miao villages.46 Techniques varied across regions, from splitting hemp fibres by hand to boiling threads with ashes to produce

41. Xiaohuang Bang, “Traditional Attire Helps Miao Women Earn a Living,” China Daily, July 14, 2017, accessed April 28,2026, https://english.news.cn/20230903/ edb6b3b31ed4436dae2321f1105c6903/c. html 42. Smithsonian Institution, “Batik and Botanic Dyes, Guizhou Province,” Smithsonian Folklife Festival 2014: China, accessed April 28, 2026, https://festival.si.edu/2014/china/ from-the-land/batik-and-botanic-dyes/ smithsonian 43. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.232.

44. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.20.

45. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.20.

46. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.20.

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heavy white yarns, often woven first and dyed later with natural colour dye.47 The loom connects Miao women to weaving both physically and spiritually, as part of their everyday life from childhood onward.

Through its continual presence, weaving marks both the passage of knowledge and the beginning of the Miao garment life cycle itself.

dyeing and calendering Dyeing follows weaving as a gradual and deliberate process, guided by repetition, patience, and familiarity with materials. Miao women dye cloth using natural pigments derived from flowers, leaves, bark, and trees sourced within the surrounding mountains.48 Indigo is commonly used and applied to finished cloth rather than individual threads, allowing color to settle evenly across the surface.49 Fabric is immersed in naturally coloured dye repeatedly, then lifted, oxidized, and returned to the dye bath, with depth of colour achieved through time rather than force.50 Using the batik method, Miao artisans draw their first layer of patterns with the hot wax, then let the dye settle into the waiting fibres.51 When the cloth is boiled and the wax melts, “a white pattern on a blue background” emerges like memory emerging from water.52

[figure 9]: Silkworm Feeding Process

47. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.20.

48. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.232.

49. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.20.

50. Han and Cong, “Miao Traditional Patterns: The Origins and Design Transformation,” p.430.

51. Han and Cong, “Miao Traditional Patterns: The Origins and Design Transformation,” p.430.

52. Han and Cong, “Miao Traditional Patterns: The Origins and Design Transformation,” p.430.

53. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.21.

54. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.21.

55. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.21.

56. Ma, “The Protection and Revitalization of Chinese Miao Embroidery,” p.2.

57. Ma, “The Protection and Revitalization of Chinese Miao Embroidery,” p.3.

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After dyeing, the cloth is calendered to compress and smooth its surface. Through repeated cycles of dyeing, drying, and beating, the cloth gradually develops a dense surface and lustrous sheen.53 In some regions the final sheen is achieved through the application of egg whites or pig blood as sizing, followed by repeated beating.54 This process gives the fabric weight, durability, and a subdued reflective surface that signals the completion of its making.55

embroidering Miao embroidery is the heart of a Miao garment. Originating from the carved tattoos of the ancient Pu people, Miao embroidery has evolved into an art form that embodies the “history of the migration process” and represents the Miao life.56 The embroidery is characterized by a diverse set of techniques, ranging from flat and thread counting embroidery to pile, lock, appliqué, and braided methods, along with more specialized practices such as seed beating and broken thread work.57

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One distinctive technique involves braiding or pleating silk threads, then curling and sewing them from the inside of the garment outward, producing a raised three-dimensional form.58 Braided embroidery follows a different logic. Silk floss is braided and then sewn flat against the cloth, creating linear patterns that emphasize rhythm and repetition.59 Both pleated and braided techniques require precision and patience, with patterns formed gradually through controlled hand movement.60 Miao embroidery includes cross stitch, satin stitch, and chain stitch, applied to garments, accessories, and household textiles.61 Patterns are often assembled from smaller units that can be cut out and reapplied to other garments or ornaments.62 Through various techniques and the embroiderer’s imagination, embroidery becomes a layered practice in which texture, colour, and form accumulate across the surface of the garment. [figure 10]: Material Sourcing Process (last page) [figure 11]: Textile Weaving Process (last page) [figure 12]: Embroidering Process (right)

58. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.21.

59. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.21.

60. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.21.

61. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.21.

62. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.21.

63. Jiang, Cai and Yin, “A Case of Miao Silver Ornaments in Xijiang Miao Village,” p.1.

64. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.25.

65. Jiang, Cai and Yin, “A Case of Miao Silver Ornaments in Xijiang Miao Village,” p.9.

66. Jiang, Cai and Yin, “A Case of Miao Silver Ornaments in Xijiang Miao Village,” p.9.

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silversmithing Silversmithing occupies a distinct place within Miao garments and extends Miao cultural expression from textiles to ornamental jewelry.

Within Miao culture, silver holds layers of meaning as it is associated with protection, purity, and spiritual presence.63 Silver ornaments are worn on the body and on the head during festivals, rituals, and significant life events to represent craftsmanship, wealth, and beauty.64 Neck rings, headdresses, earrings, and chest pieces are shaped through hammering, casting, and engraving, with motifs that echo those found in embroidery and batik patterns.65 The weight and sound of silver ornaments activate movements and transform the wearer into a living participant within their cultural history.66 The making of silver ornaments is traditionally carried out by Miao men, with knowledge passed through practice and observation within families and villages.

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wearing and inheriting Through wearing and inheriting, a Miao garment sustains its role as a cultural heirloom and remains active within the Miao life cycle. Through movement, garments enter daily life and rituals as part of social presence. Before the contemporary era Miao women and men wore Miao garments daily, and during special rituals and festivals they wore highly decorative garments.67 A Miao garment is synchronized with a Miao person’s life cycle from birth, courtship, and marriage until death, and ultimately on to the next generation.68

[figure 13]: Silk Reeling Process (last page) [figure 14]: Colour Dyeing Process (last page) [figure 15]: The life of the Miao Illustration (across page)

67. Corrigan, Miao Textiles from China, p.19.

68. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.27.

69. Hsin-Ying Cho, “The Language of Miao Embroidery,” p.6.

70. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.10.

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For instance, during courtship gatherings in Huawu Miao Village, the back panel of a woman’s dress serves as an indicator of skill and virtue; young men even “observe the embroidery” to select a partner.69 The garment is transformed into a living heirloom, becomes part of their life story, and is passed on to the next of kin.

Inheritance unfolds through this continued practice. Garments and embroidery pieces are passed down within families, repaired, adjusted, and re-worn across generations, carrying traces of previous bodies and moments. As garments pass between generations, emotional ties form; they hold ancestral memory and the care and familial sentiments embedded in their making.70 The Miao garment is never finished nor complete. Its life cycle remains open, maintained through use, passage, and renewal, allowing cultural continuity to persist through lived experience.

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chapter 3. SPATIAL THREADS

domestic craft space The making of a Miao garment has always been inseparable from vernacular Miao architecture. In the quiet corners of Miao homes, threads once formed the earliest expressions of identity through the motions of everyday making. As Gaston Bachelard observed, a dwelling becomes a “corner of the world,” a place in which life takes root by way of everyday rhythms.71 Craft practices are carried out within the spatial framework of the home, organized by hierarchy, rituals and everyday use of domestic spaces.

71. Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space, trans, Maria Jolas (Boston: Beacon Press, 1994), p.6.

72. Linping Xue, Xi Pan, Xin Wang, Honghong Zhou, Traditional Chinese Villages: Beautiful Nostalgia, 1st 2021, Singapore: Springer Nature Singapore, 2021, p.153.

73. Xue et al., Traditional Chinese Villages, p.154.

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The Miao people dwell in stilt houses, or diaojiaolou, which adapt to steep terrain through an “even up and uneven down” construction, supporting the front of the house on timber pillars while anchoring the rear onto higher ground.72 Houses are typically timber structures raised on stilts, allowing air to circulate beneath the floor while protecting interiors from moisture and uneven ground.73 The vertical organization of a Miao stilt house produces functional layering: the ground level is used for livestock, the upper floor serves as the primary living space organized around a central fire pit and curved

[figure 16]: Miao Stilted Architecture in Xijiang Village

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railing bench, and the attic level is reserved for grain and firewood storage.74 Within this spatial arrangement, craft is not removed from the household but is embedded within it, occurring alongside cooking, childcare, and conversation.

Domestic interiors also function as sites of learning, where Miao garment-making and instruction occur. Rooms such as the central hall and hearth room were connected to bedrooms, kitchens, and other living and production spaces and served as both domestic and craft spaces.75 Beyond the central hall, craft practices extend into antechambers and corridor spaces such as the tuitang, which connect directly to the main living area and provide zones where women weave, embroider, and socialize.76 Semi-private retreat spaces and side wing rooms accommodate quieter forms of making and tool storage, while sheltered ground-level spaces beneath the overhanging structure support small gatherings and teaching moments.77 Through this spatial distribution, craft remains visible, shared, and woven into the everyday movement of their domestic spaces.

communal and ritual space While domestic spaces form the foundation of Miao garment practices, communal and ritual spaces extend these activities into collective life.

Making is no longer confined to the household but moves outward into shared spaces where ceremony and social interaction converge.

Within communal settings, garments become visible and activated, allowing them to function as vital symbols of cultural identity during festivals and significant life events.

74. Xue et al., Traditional Chinese Villages, p.154.

75. Shuyang Deng and Ping Han, “Research on the Evolution of Spatial Forms of Miao and Dong Ethnic Minority Dwellings in Southeastern Guizhou,” Journal of South Architecture 2, no. 3 (2025), p.55.

76. Deng and Han, “Spatial Forms of Miao and Dong Ethnic Minority Dwellings,” p.51.

77. Deng and Han, “Spatial Forms of Miao and Dong Ethnic Minority Dwellings,” p.51.

78. Xue et al., Traditional Chinese Villages, p.157.

79. Xue et al., Traditional Chinese Villages, p.150.

80. Xue et al., Traditional Chinese Villages, p.149.

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Bronze drum squares, often arranged in radial patterns, form the core of festive life. Villagers dressed in traditional attire gather to beat the bronze drum during major events such as the Miao New Year.78 Open communal spaces function as ceremonial stages while remaining flexible enough to accommodate everyday use outside festival periods. Architecture here is not monumental but relational, defined through repeated occupation and ritual choreography.

Other communal spaces such as village gates serve as symbolic thresholds, where villagers dressed in ceremonial garments perform songs and offer wine to welcome guests or to mark departures.79 During wedding rituals, threshold spaces become memorable as villagers in Miao garments move along communal paths linking the households of the bride and groom.80 In many Miao villages, craft

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[figure 17]: Miao Architecture on Flat Ground Section Drawing [figure 18]: Miao Architecture on Slope Section Drawing [figure 19]: Miao Architecture Floor Plan Second Floor [figure 20]: Miao Architecture Floor Plan First Floor

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production extends along communal pathways, where artisans work in front of doorways while crouching on low stools to draw wax patterns or stitch pleated garments.81 These communal spaces within Miao collective memory thread together the individual stories that sustain Miao culture.

xijiang village cultural terrain Among the many Miao settlements scattered across southwest China, Xijiang Miao Village holds particular significance. The Miao population exceeds five million across China with approximately half residing in Guizhou Province.82 According to 2010 statistics, Xijiang Miao Village in northeastern Leishan County has a population of 5,414 people across 1,330 households and remains the world’s largest Miao settlement.83 The village maintains Miao garment-making as an active cultural practice integrated into everyday economic activity.84 Embroidery furthers not only historical knowledge but acts as a dynamic aspect of daily life, closely intertwined with social exchange and local economy.

81. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.169.

82. Lin, Zhang and Reilly, Richly Woven Traditions, p.19.

83. Qiong, “Traditional Culture Preservation in Chinese Ethnic Tourism Community,” p.119.

84. Qiong, “Traditional Culture Preservation in Chinese Ethnic Tourism Community,” p.119.

85. Li Yang and Feng Qian, “The Green Building’s Spatial Characteristics in Traditional Residence,” Applied Mechanics and Materials 851 (2016), p.661.

86. Yang and Qian, “The Green Building’s Spatial Characteristics in Traditional Residence,” p.661.

87. Jinyu Fan et al., “Spatial Connectivity and Development Potential of Traditional Villages in Clustered Areas: A Case Study of Qiandongnan Prefecture,” Land 14, no.

10 (2025), p.9.

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The Miao village settlement aligns with traditional geomantic principles, with mountains at the rear and the Bala River, a tributary of the Yangtze, in front.85 Guided by the belief that humans exist as part of nature, the village layout and its relationship to the surrounding environment reflect an ecological understanding that is embedded in everyday spatial organization.86 Similar to many villages in this region, its spatial layout is dictated by a “dense core, sparse periphery” pattern that follows the natural curves of the mountains.87 This relationship between mountain, water, and habitation establishes a way of living for the Miao people in which architecture, craft, and environment are closely linked.

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[figure 21]: The Map of Guizhou Province

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spatial erosion and cultural vulnerabilities In the contemporary era, migration has gradually altered the spatial conditions of Miao villages and cultural continuity. Miao communities had maintained stable traditions but modernization triggered rapid spatial transformation.88 Urban migration also led to the moving away of ritualists from the inherited altars and inherited roles, loosening ties which previously held steady the cultural fabric.89

[figure 22]: The Map of Xijiang Village

88. Jing Su and Jiuxia Sun, “Spatial Changes of Ethnic Communities during Tourism Development: A Case Study of Basha Miao Minority Community,” Journal of Tourism and Cultural Change 18, no. 3 (2020), p.334.

89. Hua Yu, “A Vernacular Way of ‘Safeguarding’ Intangible Heritage: The Fall and Rise of Rituals in Gouliang Miao Village,” International Journal of Heritage Studies 21, no. 10 (2015), p.1031.

90. Yu, “The Fall and Rise of Rituals in Gouliang Miao Village,” p.1031.

91. Deng and Han, “Spatial Forms of Miao and Dong Ethnic Minority Dwellings,” p.58.

92. Lei Gong, Jianzhu Yang, Chong Wu, and Hui Zhou, “Fractal Characteristics of the Spatial Texture in Traditional Miao Villages in Qiandongnan, Guizhou, China,” Sustainability 15, no. 17 (2023). P.3.

93. Ziqi Yi, Hongjiao Qu, and Luo Guo, “Protection and Design of Miao Traditional Village in Qiandongnan Region in China During Rapid Urbanization,” in 2024 5th International Conference on Urban Construction and Management Engineering (ICUCME 2024) (Atlantis Press, 2024), p.181.

94. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.9.

95. Qiong, “Traditional Culture Preservation in Chinese Ethnic Tourism Community,” p.119.

96. Brock et al., The Secret Language of Miao Embroidery, p.49.

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At the same time, national policies aim to control ritual practice and influence village behaviour under the banner of “spiritual civilization”.90 Modernization threatens the tectonic Miao dwellings, potentially flattening unique forms into the “thousand houses with one face.” 91 Traditional villages which were once the crystallization of human wisdom in harmony with nature now face a serious risk of spatial reshaping due to urbanization and tourism, and their historic architecture is at risk of disappearing.92 Urban pressures lead many villagers to rebuild in accordance with foreign or standardized designs, resulting in diminished historical memory.93 Today, Xijiang Village itself reflects these pressures with particular intensity. The village has shifted from agrarian self-sufficiency toward tourism-driven economies, bringing new income while transforming patterns of labour, family life, and cultural production.94 Embroidery and craft remain economically visible yet increasingly divided between traditional craftsmanship and industrial production oriented toward tourist consumption.95 At the same time, migration, return migration, and changing gender roles have reshaped domestic life and how knowledge is passed between generations.96 Garmentmaking has not disappeared in Xijiang, yet its meanings, values, and modes of transmission remain under constant negotiation.

These novel conditions expose the vulnerability of cultural continuity as spatial relationships are transformed. The households where garment-making once accumulated through shared time, the communal pathways that held ritual and craft together, and the layered presence of three or four generations within a single dwelling are traditions that have not vanished, but everyday life has loosened. As the spatial fabric thins, the practices it once carried become more difficult to sustain through shared time and proximity.

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chapter 4. INSTITUTIONAL THREADS

[figure 23]: Museum Linear Learning Diagram (next page) [figure 24]: Embodied Garment-making Learning Diagram (next page)

97. Ma, “The Protection and Revitalization of Chinese Miao Embroidery,” p.7.

98. Tony Bennett, The Birth of the Museum: History, Theory, Politics (London: Routledge, 1995), p.63.

99。 James Clifford, “On Collecting Art and Culture,” in The Predicament of Culture: Twentieth-Century Ethnography, Literature, and Art (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988), p.222–226

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As migration, urbanization, and rural transformation continue to weaken the spatial and social conditions of Miao garmentmaking, contemporary institutions have taken on the responsibility of safeguarding the practice. Three primary frameworks now shape how Miao garments are preserved and presented: museum display, Intangible Cultural Heritage designation, and tourism. Each offers a form of recognition, and each has expanded the public presence of Miao culture within China and beyond.97 None of these frameworks is inherently negative. Together, however, they reveal a recurring tension between cultural visibility and cultural continuity. The garment is increasingly seen, named, and circulated, yet the slow, embodied conditions through which a garment becomes a garment are quieter than the systems that now claim to safeguard them. What presents itself as preservation also reshapes the living practice it seeks to protect.

the garment as artifact Within the museum, the Miao garment is encountered as an artwork.

Visitors approach the embroidered garment or silver ornament from a distance, separated by glass and accompanied by a written label that condenses centuries of practice into a few lines. Museums stabilize objects through ordering and display, presenting them within what Tony Bennett describes as an “exhibitionary complex” that arranges things into legible relations for a public.98 As James Clifford has argued, this mode of collection extracts objects from the lived contexts of their making, where they are read as either ethnographic specimens or aesthetic forms.99 What remains is surface, pattern, colour, and technique without the slow accumulation of skill and meaning that gives the garment its life.

The Guizhou Provincial Museum, which holds one of the most significant ethnic textile collections in southwest China, illustrates this logic. Its ethnic exhibition foregrounds craftsmanship and material technique while compressing the surrounding worlds of festival, household, and labour into background information.100 As scholars of Chinese ethnographic museums have noted, ethnic minorities are often framed in ways that render them legible to a national public but flatten the texture of their lived practice.101 Visitors leave with a sense of beauty and difference but rarely with an understanding of the years a Miao garment takes to make, nor the relational conditions through which embroidery passes from one generation to another.

100.。 Xiaolin Sun and Eugene Ch’ng, “Evaluating the Management of Ethnic Minority Heritage and the Use of Digital Technologies for Learning,” Journal of Cultural Heritage Management and Sustainable Development 16, no. 7 (2026): 127–149, https://doi.org/10.1108/ JCHMSD-03-2023-0024.

101.。 Marzia Varutti, Museums in China: The Politics of Representation after Mao (Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2014), 129–144, doi:10.1515/9781782042105.

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the garment as cultural heritage The intangible cultural heritage framework offers a different mode of preservation, organized around classification and certification.

Following China’s ratification of the UNESCO 2003 Convention, Miao embroidery was inscribed on the first national list of intangible cultural heritage in 2006, followed shortly after by Miao silver ornament forging.102 These recognitions confirmed at the national level that Miao garment-making is a practice worth safeguarding and they opened pathways to public funding and broader visibility.

[figure 25]: National Cultural Heritage System Diagram (right)

102. Ma, “The Protection and Revitalization of Chinese Miao Embroidery,” p.7.

103. World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO), Law of the People’s Republic of China on Intangible Cultural Heritage, adopted February 25, 2011, effective June 1, 2011, arts. 29–31, WIPO Lex, https://www.wipo.int/wipolex/en/ text/336567.

104. Christina Maags, “Creating a Race to the Top: Hierarchies and Competition within the Chinese ICH Transmitters System,” in Chinese Heritage in the Making: Experiences, Negotiations and Contestations, ed. Christina Maags and Marina Svensson (Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2018), 121–144.

105. Yu, “The Fall and Rise of Rituals in Gouliang Miao Village,” p.1032.

106. Ma, “The Protection and Revitalization of Chinese Miao Embroidery,” p.5-6.

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Alongside the listing of practices, the system identifies individual practitioners as “representative inheritors”, formally responsible for transmitting the craft.103 In principle, this stabilizes lines of transmission. In practice, it introduces a logic of selection that sits uneasily with how Miao garment-making has historically been carried.

Maags has shown how the inheritor system creates hierarchies among practitioners and redirects authority away from collective village transmission toward state-recognized individuals, narrowing what was once a shared, household-based practice into an administrative pedigree.104 Hua Yu’s ethnographic study of Gouliang Miao Village describes how state frameworks select, simplify, and stage cultural forms in ways that conflict with vernacular understandings of how these practices should continue.105 A second pattern emerges through commercialization. Once a practice is officially recognized, its motifs circulate through markets, souvenir economies, and online platforms. At the same time, persistent youth migration, declining apprenticeships, and the narrowing of household-based learning all reveal the gap between visibility and lived practice.106

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photo spots

restuaran ticketing admin

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In December 2020, Xijiang Qianhu Miao Village passed the evaluation for designation as a National 5A-level scenic area. In 2023, the Xijiang Qianhu scenic area received over 4 million visitors.

The Shanghai–Kunming High-Speed Railway reached Kaili South railway station on 18 June 2015, when that Guizhou section was put into operation.

the garment as cultural heritage

[figure 26]: Xijiang Village Tourism Diagram [figure 27]: Contemporary Xijiang Village (next page)

107. Jiang, Cai and Yin, “A Case of Miao Silver Ornaments in Xijiang Miao Village,” p.7.

108. John Connell, Phil McManus, and Xuesong Ding, “Daka: A New Chinese Tourist Geography,” in Chinese Tourism in Australia (Singapore: Springer Nature Singapore, 2024), 131–166, https://doi. org/10.1007/978-981-97-2477-2_6.

109. Jiang, Cai and Yin, “A Case of Miao Silver Ornaments in Xijiang Miao Village,” p.9.

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Tourism has reorganized Xijiang Miao Village along a different rhythm. Following infrastructural investment beginning in the late 2000s, the village now receives several million visitors each year, with ticketed entry, sightseeing trams, performance schedules, and night-time illuminations structuring the visitor experience.107 What tourism alters is the temporal condition of encounter. A visitor who spends an afternoon in Xijiang sees garments worn at scheduled performances, photographed against scenic backdrops, and arranged for sale in stalls along the main street. The Miao garment becomes an image to be captured, often within a daka travel rhythm in which destinations are visited primarily to be photographed and shared online.108 Time compresses. The garment that once required ten months to a year of slow making is now consumed within minutes. Jiang, Cai, and Yin have documented how Miao garments and silver ornaments have been gradually repositioned for tourist performance, shifting from ritual and household contexts toward staged display.109 The garment is no longer carried primarily

Reflecting the village’s rapid tourism expansion since 2007, Xijiang Qianhu Miao Village now has over 500 hotels and inns to accommodate visitors from around the world.

nts and hotels

garment rental The first McDonald’s opened on June 17, 2024, at a location near the west gate of the Xijiang Village.

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souvenir shops Costume rental has become part of the village’s tourism economy, with visitors able to rent Miao traditional dress for photography and cultural experience.

Staged performances turn the village into a managed cultural stage, where Miao songs and dances are scheduled for visitors throughout the day and evening.

through the slow choreography of household and festival but through the rapid choreography of arrival, gaze, and departure.

Across these three frameworks Miao garments become more visible, yet the conditions that allow garment-making to continue as a lived practice are not the same as the conditions that produce visibility.

As Tim Ingold has argued, embodied skill is acquired through what he calls enskilment, an “understanding in practice” in which learning is inseparable from doing and in which both depend on attentive dwelling alongside skilled others.110 Such conditions cannot be substituted by display, certification, or commercial circulation, however well-intentioned each may be. The institutions that mediate Miao garments are not failing because they are malicious; they operate on logics, the visual, the categorical, and the consumable, which are incompatible with the durational and communal nature of garment making. To recognize this incompatibility is not to call for the dismantling of these institutional frameworks, but to ask what other forms of experience might exist alongside them.

110. Tim Ingold, The Perception of the Environment: Essays on Livelihood, Dwelling and Skill (London: Routledge, 2000), p.416.

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chapter 5. FUTURE THREADS

As a result of this thesis and in response to the challenges examined in the previous chapters, I designed a speculative future narrative that imagines how Miao garment-making continues as a living practice rather than as a preserved heritage. Set in the near future of 2075, the narrative tells the story of a Miao garmentmaking apprenticeship residency program in Xijiang Miao Village that returns garment-making to the rhythm of the agricultural calendar. The narrative is not a prediction but rather a possible imagination of how cultural continuity might be sustained through embodied learning, collective participation, and shared knowledge.

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the phone call with asha

Asha: Hello, Miao Garment Apprenticeship Residency Program. This is Asha speaking. How can I help you?

Denny: Hi Asha. My name is Denny. I came across your residency page online a few days ago, and I found myself completely absorbed.

I have been wanting to learn more ever since.

Asha: Nice to meet you, Denny. I am very happy to help in any way I can.

Denny: Thank you. Let me introduce myself. I grew up in China and now live in Vancouver, Canada. When I was younger, my grandmother used to tell me stories from her travels. That was the first time I heard about Miao garments. A few months ago, I came across a Hundred Birds garment in a museum, and I was immediately captivated by its colours, textures, and patterns. The garment felt beautiful and deeply meaningful. Since then, I have been reading everything I could find about the Miao people and their culture. I still have so much to learn.

That is when I found your program.

Asha: That is wonderful to hear. You are calling the right place.

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Denny: Could you tell me more about how the residency actually works?

Asha: Of course. The residency is community-led. It is organized by my mother, together with several embroiderers in the village. Over the past few years, we have welcomed students from across China and from many other parts of the world. The program has four inperson sessions, each lasting one month. Together, they follow the full cycle of Miao garment-making, which has always been tied to the agricultural calendar. In spring, women cultivate the rice fields while planting cotton and hemp and raising silkworms. Summer is the busiest farming season, so there is less time for making, but people gather flowers, bark, and plants for natural dyes. In autumn, after the rice harvest, materials are processed and prepared for weaving.

Autumn is also when the Miao New Year takes place. In winter, as agricultural work slows, embroidery becomes the main focus.

Our program follows this same rhythm so that learners come to understand garment-making as a relationship between land, labour, material, and culture.

Denny: I love that the village itself becomes part of the learning process.

Asha: Yes, exactly. The residency is built around embodied learning.

People do not come here just for a workshop and leave with a finished object. They stay with local families, participate in everyday life, and learn slowly through observation, repetition, and shared experience.

Between sessions, we continue to support learners through online courses and remote guidance.

Denny: That sounds exactly like what I had hoped to find.

Asha, this has been such a helpful conversation. I feel even more certain now that this is the right decision.

Asha: You are very welcome, Denny. We would be very happy to have you join us.

[figure 28]: Feeding Silkworms in Spring (next page) [figure 29]: Planting Dye Flowers in Spring (next page) [figure 30]: Planting Hemp and Cotton in Spring (next page)

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Denny: I will follow up by email to register after this call. Thank you again, Asha.

Asha: Wonderful. Our first session begins in spring, so we hope to see you very soon.

apprenticeship residency learning diaries Spring Session Week 1 March 15, 2075. Xijiang Village.

The maglev train slowed into the village just before noon. Wooden houses spilled down the mountainside in layers, their roofs darkened by rain, their balconies hung with cloth. Mist held in the trees and did not lift all morning.

Asha’s family met me at the platform and her mother took my bag before I could protest. The stilted house, diaojiaolou, stood among newer modern Miao timber buildings, all set within the misty mountains. By the time we reached the house where I would be staying, I had been introduced to half a dozen people whose names I would have to learn slowly.

On the first day of class, I met Asha’s grandmother, one of the village’s certified garment makers and a lead teacher in the program. We met inside one of the rooms in the learning centre, a low timber building that smelled of fresh wood, where she had set out trays of silkworms.

They made a faint sound, almost like rain on paper, as they ate. Grandma explained that this used to happen entirely outdoors, in spaces close to where mulberry trees grew. The climate has changed. The room we stood in was the program’s answer. Over the following days, we watched the silkworms grow until they began to spin their cocoons.

[figure 31]: Learning Annotation Spring Session in Week 1 (next page) [figure 32]: Learning Annotation Spring Session in Week 2 (next page) [figure 33]: Learning Annotation Spring Session in Week 3-4 (next page)

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Weeks 2 to 4 In the following weeks, we gathered at an outdoor dye garden near the learning centre where Grandma introduced us to the different plants used for dyeing. Traditionally, Miao women extracted pigment from flowers, roots, and tree barks gathered directly from the surrounding landscape. Today those practices continue, supported by new approaches such as dedicated dye gardens and vertical planting systems built throughout the village. We also joined Grandma and several women from the community in planting cotton and hemp in an open field along the mountainside. The soil was darker than I expected, and warmer. [figure 34]: Planting Dye flowers in Dye Garden Spring Session (right) [figure 35]: Learning Annotation Spring Session in Week 2 (next page)

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With that, my spring session came to a close. I returned to Vancouver to continue with the online portion of the program, carrying the rhythms of the village with me into the months ahead.

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Summer Session Weeks 5 and 6 June 15, 2075, Xijiang Village I returned to the village for my summer session. The hemp and cotton I had helped to plant in the spring had grown tall and the air was heavy with the smell of green things. We began by learning how to process the raw fibres into thread. Through retting, drying, hackling, shredding, and reeling, raw material was slowly transformed into workable fibre. Grandma reminded us that learning this traditional process matters not only because it shows how fabric is made, but because it reveals how deeply material knowledge is rooted in the natural world.

Week 7

[figure 36]: Making Natural Dye in Commual Space Summer Session (right) [figure 37]: Learning Annotation summer Session in Week 7-8 (right) [figure 38]: Shredding Hemp in Summer (next page) [figure 39]: Reeling Silk in Summer (next page) [figure 40]: Dyeing Threads in Summer (next page) [figure 41]: Learning Annotation Summer Session in Week 5 (next page) [figure 42]: Learning Annotation Summer Session in Week 6 (next page) [figure 43]: Learning Annotation Summer Session in Week 7 (next page)

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Under the guidance of Grandma and Asha, I then learned how to reel silk thread. Once the cocoons had fully developed, they were boiled and the silk was drawn out, sometimes by hand, sometimes with the help of machines. The thread came off the cocoons in a single fine line, almost weightless against my fingers. It was one of the clearest moments in which I understood how the program holds tradition and adaptation together. By this point, the dye plants we had first encountered in spring were in full bloom. We harvested them, set them out to dry, and began extracting pigment and bonding it to thread.

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Week 8

[figure 44]: Dinner With the Miao Families in Summer Session (right)

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The summer session ended with a family dinner in the courtyard of our residence. Tables had been set end to end under strings of small lights, and the air smelled of rice wine and grilled fish.

Learners and families cooked together and talked about how the village had changed over the past several decades. Grandma and the other elders spoke at length about the institutions that had shaped Miao garment-making in the early decades of the century, and the ways those frameworks had altered the conditions of the practice.

Listening, I began to understand more clearly why the apprenticeship model exists in the form it does, and why it places embodied learning and shared knowledge at the centre of what it offers.

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Autumn Session Weeks 9 to 11 October, 2075, Xijiang Village I returned for the fall session. The air had turned cooler and the village felt busier. Harvest celebrations and festivals were approaching, and the energy was contagious. This session focused on weaving thread into fabric. We started with handweaving on floor looms to understand how threads interlace, while modern weaving machines ran nearby in the community workshop. The point was never to replace one method with the other, but to understand how traditional knowledge and contemporary tools can work in conversation.

Week 12

[figure 45]: Weaving Textile in Autumn Session (right) [figure 46]: Learning Annotation Autumn Session in Week 9 (right) [figure 47]: Miao New Year Festival in Autumn Session (next page left) [figure 48]: Weaving Class in Autumn Session (next page right) [figure 49]: Learning Annotation Autumn Session in Week 7-8 (next page right)

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The autumn session ended with the Miao New Year. Houses had been swept, garments brought out from where they had been kept folded in the closet, and the drum square at the centre of the village was strung with lanterns.

We gathered in the village square. The drums began first, low and slow, and then the lusheng pipes were joined. The villagers moved into a wide circle and learners were folded in, hand in hand with people I had only just met. Everyone wore their garments. The silver on the older women caught the light and made small sounds as they moved, a soft chiming that travelled through the circle. Standing there, between people who were strangers to me seven months earlier, I realized I wanted to come back the following year wearing my own version of the Hundred Birds garment.

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Winter Session Week 13 December, 2075.

The final month of my learning journey took place in winter. The village was misty and everything felt quieter and more concentrated, as if the season itself was asking for patience. Grandma began by teaching us the symbolic meanings carried in Miao garments. On a screen, she walked us through key motifs and explained the story of Butterfly Mother, who laid twelve eggs representing the twelve clans of the Miao. With the help of the Jiyu bird those eggs eventually hatched, giving rise to the Miao people. This story, she told us, is at the heart of what gives meaning to the Hundred Birds garment.

Week 14

[figure 50]: Embroidery Class in Winter Session (right) [figure 51]: Learning Annotation Winter Session in Week 14 (right) [figure 52]: Embroidery Pattern Making in Winter Session (next page) [figure 53]: Embroidery Class in Winter Session (next page) [figure 54]: Garment Tailoring in Winter Session (next page) [figure 55]: Learning Annotation Winter Session in Week 13 (next page) [figure 56]: Learning Annotation Winter Session in Week 14 (next page) [figure 57]: Learning Annotation Winter Session in Week 16 (next page)

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This week, Grandma showed us how the embroidery process begins long before any thread touches cloth. Traditionally, paper patterns were made by hand to position and guide embroiderers as they stitched onto a garment. In our embroidery studio, laser-cut paper patterns are now commonly used, allowing learners to work efficiently while preserving the role of the pattern as a guide for the hand. Like the silkworm raising and the dye gardens, this was another moment when the program quietly held tradition and contemporary tools in conversation.

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Week 15 The embroidery class I had been looking forward to finally started.

Grandma explained that Miao embroidery carries the memory of migration, history, and storytelling. It is one of the most timeintensive parts of the entire process, encompassing techniques from flat embroidery and counted thread work to pile, lock, appliqué, and braided methods. The first stitches I made were slow and uneven. Grandma watched without correcting them. Through these techniques, thread becomes line, and line draws into narrative.

Week 16 In the final week of the residency, we began piecing embroidered sections together into the first draft of the garment. The pieces were uneven and small, but laid out together they began to suggest something greater. As I held them, I understood that the value of this journey was never about completing an object. Through this embodied learning process I had come to understand how garmentmaking connects deeply with Miao culture, history, land, belief, and community. Supported by contemporary technologies yet grounded in collective practice, the apprenticeship program sustains Miao culture not simply by preserving garments, but by creating the conditions for knowledge to continue to be lived, shared, and passed on.

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conclusion

The contemporary challenges examined across the earlier chapters of this thesis, including migration from rural villages, the decline of apprenticeship within the household, spatial erosion, the institutional frameworks of museum display, intangible cultural heritage designation, and tourism, have initiated the inquiry this research has carried forward. In response, Threads of the Miao has approached Miao garment-making not as a preserved artifact but as a living practice. The speculative future narrative imagines, through a community-led apprenticeship residency in Xijiang Miao Village, how cultural continuity might be sustained through a participatory learning experience.

In The Eyes of the Skin, Juhani Pallasmaa argues that architecture has been flattened by vision, reduced to an image to be looked at, photographed, and consumed. 111 What it loses is the sensory and lived experience of architecture and the way it is touched, walked through, and inhabited over time. Miao garments have been flattened in a manner that is parallel. Like architecture, a Miao garment cannot be fully encountered as a piece of art nor a heritage object.

Its cosmology, its history, its language, its belief, its connection to land and to the body that wears it, are all dependent on the embodied process through which the garment is made and worn.

Threads of the Miao continues to challenge contemporary issues and proposes Miao garment-making as a living practice carried through embodied learning, collective participation, and shared knowledge.

111. Juhani Pallasmaa, The Eyes of the Skin: Architecture and the Senses, 2nd ed. (Chichester: Wiley-Academy, 2005), p.30.

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[figure 58]: Front of the Garment (left) [figure 59]: Back of the Garment (right)

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[figure 60]: Full Learning Annotation of the Garment (left) [figure 61]: Full Learning Annotation of the Garment 2 (right)

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