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| Zhao Fei at the opening ceremony |
London once again became the show-piece for traditional arts and crafts during the 2026 London Craft Week which ran until 17th May. Celebrating outstanding British and international creativity, the festival brought together over a thousand established and emerging makers, designers, brands and galleries from around the world. A curated selection based not on price or fame, but underlying substance. Plus, that essential dash of magic and inspiration that separates great from good.
Must-see exhibitions and events were held across the capital during the 12th edition of London Craft Week as well as a series of demonstrations, artist talks, and micro-workshops that showed how communities preserve heritage while reimagining it for the future.
The China Pavilion showcased achievements in the preservation and innovation of Chinese craftsmanship and highlighted its important role in supporting poverty alleviation and rural revitalisation.
Guy Salter, the founder and Chairman of London Craft Week, said “the works presented in this year’s China Pavilion continuously update and reinterpret tradition through contemporary art and fashion design, challenging conventional perceptions of traditional craft itself.
“The exhibition unfolds through three curatorial threads: reconstructed historical wedding attire, the textile systems of Southwest Chinese ethnic minorities, and auspicious motifs that run throughout the exhibition space. Together, they form a broader discussion about the emotional structures embedded within Chinese culture – how family, marriage, female labour, bodily experience and intergenerational memory are preserved through needlework, fabric and handcraft”.
With the theme of Those Who Make China Beautiful, this year’s China Pavilion focuses on Chinese female handicraft creators and intangible cultural heritage inheritors. The exhibition featured wedding costumes, ethnic embroidery, auspicious patterns, and contemporary craft innovation. It integrated the thousand-year-old Eastern context with contemporary design expression to present a credible, lovely and respectable Chinese image to the world. Helping to promote China’s excellent traditional culture overseas and continuing to write a new chapter of exchanges and mutual learning between China and the United Kingdom.
The exhibition was organised by Art and Design Press, with the strong support of the London Craft Week Organising Committee and the Chinese Embassy in the UK, Media support was provided by the Nouvelles d’Europe UK. Important guests from China and the UK in fields including art, business, and design gathered at the opening site to witness Eastern crafts on one of the world’s top craft stages.
At the opening ceremony Zhao Fei from the Chinese Embassy in London said China’s traditional craftsmanship, both well preserved and continuously evolving, is an important vehicle for carrying forward Chinese culture in the new era. It is a vivid expression of the beauty of China. China’s beauty is rooted in its historical and cultural heritage, shaped by continuous development, grounded in its people’s pursuit of a better life, and enriched through exchanges and mutual learning among civilisations. The outline of the 15th Five-Year Plan, released not long ago, highlights the need to better preserve intangible cultural heritage and create new scenarios for immersive experiences. This will provide stronger institutional support for the development of crafts, while opening up broader prospects for cultural exchange and cooperation between China and the United Kingdom.
