Shopping in Lijiang is amazing. Many oriental style home-make products are displaying on the Square Street Market.
Hide Processing After the Yuan and Ming Dynasties, there were some people specialized in hide processing in Lijiang. Most of them gathered in the Shuhe Town and the town of Dayan. Shuhe is a famous cobber Town. The Tibetan boots, shoes, leather bags and leather ropes are even sold to Tibet and Tibetan areas in Xikang. During the period of anti-Iapanese War, Lijiang Branch of China Industrial Cooperation helped build a hide cooperative in China. They sent craftsmen to Chongqing for training. These craftsmen learnt new skills and technology of hide processing there. They could even make shoes that were popular in London and New York.
Silver Processing In the Qing Dynasty, there was a silversmith alley in old town. The silverwares that they made are mainly for daily and religious use. The wooden bowls with silver edges made in Lijiang are very popular among the Tibetans.
Spinning and Weaving The handicraft of making cloth from fur, linen, silk and cotton is passed down from generation to generation among the Naxi people. The clever and deft Naxi women all know how to make cloth. Usually, anyone of them can grasp several ways and skills of weaving. Most clothes in the family are made from their hands. Till 1939, there had been already 700 wooden spinning wheels in the town of Dayan.
Copper Processing Naxi copperware is famous in Tibet and northwest of Yunnan. The most famous product is Lijiang copper lock. In the past, large number of copperwares were sent to Tibet. It was even the most important product traded through the ancient Tea-horse Road. Lots of copperwares in the Potala Palace and other big temples in Lhasa of Tibet were made in Lijiang. Baisha had been the center of copper processing in the history. After the Qing Dynasty, coppersmiths of Baisha moved to Dayan and gathered in a street of the square market.
Pottery The Lijiang potteries made of the "golden sand clay" have the color as natural as the land of this place.
China tours inclusive of visiting Lijiang
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