Basic Introduction to Eternal Spring Lacquer Baskets
The Eternal Spring Lacquer Basket is a renowned Han Chinese lacquerware handicraft in the Minnan region of Fujian Province. As an important household item, lacquer baskets are widely popular in the Minnan area and were essential items for a daughter's dowry in earlier times. They are also used as containers for items during significant events such as worshiping deities, ancestral ceremonies, birthdays, celebrations, visiting relatives, and meeting friends, or as gifts exchanged between people.
The lacquer basket has become an integral part of Minnan culture. When the Minnan people crossed the seas and reached Southeast Asia, the lacquer basket became part of the overseas Chinese culture. Many overseas Chinese from Southeast Asia who return to their hometowns always bring a few lacquer baskets back with them as a way to express their longing for home.
Product Features
The Eternal Spring Lacquer Basket is meticulously crafted, watertight, and unbreakable even when dropped. The lid can support over a hundred pounds when placed on the ground without any movement. The entire basket is exquisitely made and shines brightly. There are over 100 different sizes and specifications, with larger ones having multiple layers, a diameter of 42 centimeters, and a height of 72 centimeters. These baskets can hold two to three kilograms of items and can be carried by hand or on one's shoulder. During festivals, they can be filled with food and hung from ventilated rafters, serving as a hygienic and unique “airborne pantry”.
Historical Folklore
Approximately during the Ming Dynasty, artisans from Longshui Village in Eternal Spring began making daily-use items like baskets, trays, sieves, and cages from bamboo. They were very meticulous about basket-making: they split bamboo into thin strips resembling silk and wove them into baskets, coated them with tung oil paste, pasted cloth on them, applied raw lacquer, and adorned them with various golden patterns. This type of lacquer basket quickly became popular throughout the Minnan region.
“The bamboo basket does not leave the water empty” refers to the Eternal Spring Lacquer Basket from Quanzhou City, Fujian Province. Its unique processing technique makes it watertight, and its crafting technique has a history of over 500 years.
Manufacturing Process
If detailed, there are more than 30 steps involved in making a lacquer basket. Generally speaking, the process can be divided into three main steps: bamboo weaving, gray work, and lacquer painting and stack sculpture.
Bamboo Weaving
The raw material for the lacquer basket is moso bamboo, which is abundant locally. In the hands of 64-year-old villager Guo Qingbai, the bamboo is split into halves, then quarters, and further into eighths… until it becomes bamboo slats of varying thickness. The thickness of the slats depends on the requirements of the lacquer basket, with the thinnest being as fine as a hair. Using the slats as the warp and the bamboo threads as the weft, skilled hands weave them into baskets. These baskets come in various sizes, including flat baskets, partitioned baskets, storage baskets, boxes, and trays.
The woven bamboo baskets, compared to the finished lacquer baskets, are referred to as “basket molds”.
Gray Work
The saying “the bamboo basket is left empty after fetching water” does not apply to these lacquer baskets, which become sturdy, lightweight, and watertight due to the second step, known as “gray work”.
The term “gray work” can be understood as applying a layer of gray paste. Guo Yunyong, 74 years old and with 56 years of experience in gray work, explains that soil is dug up from fields, dried, finely ground, and sifted to obtain flour-like soil powder. This fine soil powder is mixed with tung oil to create “oil gray.” The gray work process is very intricate, starting with boiling the basket mold in lime water, shaping the basket, trimming the bamboo ends, and then applying gray paste to the basket body. Patterns are cut out from cloth, which is then pasted onto the basket along with paper. Fine gray paste is also applied to the bottom and sides of the basket, followed by trimming, sanding, applying clear oil and black oil. Altogether, there are more than 20 large and small steps in the process.
Lacquer Painting and Stack Sculpture
Lacquer painting and stack sculpture are the finishing touches that bring the lacquer basket to life.
The lacquer work process is generally as follows: processing raw lacquer, brushing and smoothing the basket, cleaning the basket, applying lacquer, water-polishing it in water, applying gold leaf, installing gold lines, outlining in vermilion red, and installing gold flowers.
After undergoing lacquer painting and stack sculpture, the lacquer basket transforms from a plain appearance to one that is elegant and grand.