Dafang Holland Creative Village

Dafang is one of 150 traditional Chinese rural villages in Jinxi County Municipality in southeast China. As in many places in the world, the countryside in China is facing a population decline. China is making an enormous effort to revitalize its deserted countryside. The stimulation of rural tourism has an important place in this effort. In this context, Jinxi County council has asked the Dutch IVEM to transform one of its villages into a tourist attraction where the younger generation of Chinese urbanites would like to visit. IVEM chose Total Design to design the village’s new visual identity.

My role
Creative Director
Designer

Dragon Tower

We made a logo and a styling. The development plan for the village was based, among other things, on an iconic building for visual marketing: a beautiful tower in the form of a double helix. An abstraction of that tower has become the logo. Furthermore, with a mix of floral styling and styling based on traditional porcelain motifs, we have laid a foundation for the marketing of all kinds of products that will be on view and on sale in this Holland Creative Village, from bags and clothing to beer bottles. We followed up on the request to use gold as the dominant color in the eventual development of the logo and styling. Jinxi means ‘golden flow’ and that symbolic, almost narrative concept is still so much valued that it can be dominant in the final design.

Dafang Holland Creative Village has recently opened, attracting already thousands of visitors each day, as China has started to open up post Corona. The project is now regarded as an example project by the province of Jiangxi, in which Dafang is located. The success will be replicated in more villages throughout the region.