Taiwan Tourism100 Spotlights: Yingge
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The beauty of pottery clay has brought light and heat to Yingge's culture. More than 200 years of pottery-making history have accumulated a deep foundation of craftsmanship. Yingge is now a major center of the ceramic industry and a source of art and culture in New Taipei City after going through the ups and downs of industrial transformation. Come to Yingge Ceramic Old Street, which is listed in the "Taiwan Tourism100 Spotlights" by the Tourism Administration of the Ministry of Transportation and Communications, to experience the beauty of handmade pottery. Also, walk to the New Taipei City Art Museum, which will open in April 2025, to spark inspiration between contemporary art and local culture.
Yingge and the Ceramic Industry
Located on the north bank of the Dahan River, Yingge and Sanxia face each other. The Taiwan Railway Yingge Station is the transportation hub of this ceramic capital. In the past, people mainly used this station for coal transportation, and it was responsible for transporting coal mined in the Sanxia mountain area. Yingge has become a tourist destination with ceramics and art as its business cards.
We can trace Yingge's pottery-making history back 200 years. Yingge's natural conditions, such as clay, abundant firewood and coal resources, and water transportation on the Dahan River, enabled the development of the ceramic industry. During the whole bloom period of Yingge pottery, the numerous factory chimneys were once the representative scenery of Yingge.
Yingge Ceramics Old Street is between Jianshanpu Street, Yuying Street, and Chongqing Street. After being renovated by the New Taipei City Government, the original old kiln factory has been transformed into a ceramic specialty store, art studio, DIY classroom, and exhibition center, pioneering Taiwan's experiential tourism. Walking along the street, parents and children laughing and interacting in the pottery-throwing classroom is the warmest life scene in Yingge.
Located south of Ceramic Old Street, the New Taipei City Yingge Ceramics Museum focuses on the development of Taiwan's ceramics industry and presents the ancestors' life traces on this land. The Ceramics Museum actively interacts with Yingge's thriving community, promoting Yingge's cultural tourism construction and international artistic exchanges. It is an excellent choice to explore the charm of Yingge ceramics.
DIY Experience in The Shu's Pottery
The Shu's Pottery, which opened in 1926, has witnessed the glory and innovation of Yingge's pottery-making industry in the past century. As the first tourist factory in Yingge to pass the central government's evaluation, The Shu's Pottery has renovated its pottery-making factory to create a spacious and bright DIY experience area, light meal and coffee area, and exhibition and sales space to reshape the "feelings of life" of pottery. Besides its porcelain brand, it also promotes the works of artists from Taiwan and Japan.
The Shu's Pottery is like a living pottery time machine. The factory retains antique equipment such as gas kilns and kick-potter's wheel, allowing visitors to return to the early days of pottery. The DIY area in the museum has four major experience spaces: pottery-throwing, pottery-pinching, under-glaze painting, and mosaics collaging. Under the professional and friendly guidance of the pottery teacher, you can create your unique work. What's more fascinating is the railway outside the factory window. When you concentrate on hand-throwing the pottery, the train also accompanies you.
New Taipei City Art Museum
The New Taipei City Art Museum, officially opening in 2025, is a new art landmark in Yingge. Located in the new land where the Yingge River and the Dahan River convergence, the museum's silver-white exterior is inspired by the image of reeds commonly seen on the riverbank, with staggered high and low tubular lines outlining the reeds swaying in the wind. Its transparent and open space allows the museum to blend into the riverside landscape, becoming an aesthetic community that is both open and interactive.
The New Taipei City Art Museum covers the main building, the Xinmei rendezvous, the Xinmei gathering place, and the outdoor park, allowing different art forms to shine in the right space. Several public artworks are in the outdoor park, the most eye-catching of which is the 15-meter-high orange-red standing greenware, which pays tribute to Yingge's ceramic culture.
The New Taipei City Art Museum's vast outdoor park occasionally holds art fairs, concerts, dance performances, and fireworks shows, injecting endless artistic vitality into Yingge. Yingge has gradually moved from the industrial era of blazing kilns to an art town that integrates pottery and aesthetics. With the opening of the Sanying Line MRT in the future, the excitement will continue to unfold.
