Laura Li, a teacher from Jilin Province in northeast China, visited the National Museum of China during her trip to Beijing in early June, specifically for a closer look at a phoenix coronet, a renowned item in the institution’s collection. The coronet was worn by Empress Xiaoduan, wife of Emperor Wanli (reigning from 1563 to 1620) of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), when visiting and making sacrifices in the ancestral temple.

The coronet, unearthed in 1957 from the Dingling Tomb of Emperor Wanli, part of the Ming Tombs in Beijing, has a distinctive design and boasts the exquisite craftsmanship of the mid-to-late Ming era. With decoration featuring nine dragons and nine phoenixes, it is adorned with around 4,000 pearls and 115 gemstones, with dangling beaded strings that sway with movement. The base is covered with vibrant blue kingfisher feathers, a rare and luxurious addition that creates a shimmering, jewel-like effect.

After viewing the exhibit, Li waited in line for nearly 30 minutes to purchase two souvenir fridge magnets inspired by the artifact. These magnets have been a runaway hit since their launch in July 2024, with their popularity enduring for months.

“I was drawn by posts featuring the fridge magnets on social media platforms. Many young people like me are attracted by its delicate design and the culture that surrounds it,” Li told Beijing Review.

The two types of fridge magnet are made of wood and metal, respectively. People can scan a QR code on the metal magnet to experience the augmented reality effect. The museum has also introduced other spin-off products based on the coronet including keychains and music boxes.

In recent years, creative cultural products have become a trendy hit among Chinese young people, driving innovative approaches to cultural promotion and creating a substantial market. Popular travel destinations, including museums and zoos, are riding the tide to develop their own cultural intellectual properties through a reimagination of traditional culture.

Cultural craze

Around a decade ago, the Palace Museum in Beijing and the Dunhuang Museum in Dunhuang, a city in the northwestern province of Gansu, began rolling out creative cultural products based on artifacts in their collections to woo young visitors. The former was home to 24 emperors of the Ming and Qing dynasties (1368-1911) and houses over 1.5 million items or sets of relics, while the latter boasts more than 13,000 artifacts and artworks, including precious relics from the Mogao Caves, a World Heritage site. Since then, the innovative approach has been adopted by other cultural destinations at an increasing rate.

Inspired by visitors’ photos posing with the coronet, cultural product designers with the National Museum of China developed the idea of creating fridge magnet collections. To recreate the phoenix coronet in a modern way, they studied historical records and adopted modern miniature cloisonné techniques and synthetic gems to present the intricate details, turning the ancient treasure into a tangible everyday work of art.

Over 1 million these fridge magnets were sold in the first eight months of their launch, with earnings reaching 100 million yuan ($13.9 million). The museum’s sales of creative cultural products in 2024 saw a 90-percent year-on-year growth, it said.

Products based on the famous bronze galloping horse housed in the Gansu Provincial Museum have been a hit since 2022. With adorable and slightly goofy facial expressions, the bronze horse, a relic from the Han Dynasty (202 B.C.-A.D. 220), has been given new life by being transformed into a range of items like plush keychains, headgear and bookmarks.

The museum has also introduced souvenirs featuring local specialties, such as malatang, a street food consisting of meat and vegetables boiled in chili oil. At the museum’s gift shop, consumers can choose plush toy ingredients like broccoli or meatballs, just as they would in a malatang restaurant.

First introduced last year, the zaojing-themed creative cultural products of the Beijing Ancient Architecture Museum have also sparked a craze. As a distinctive architectural feature of temples or palaces in ancient China, zaojing, or caisson ceiling, is an ornamental sunken panel in a ceiling or dome. Carved and built with consummate skills, the ceiling decorations have remained undiminished over time.

The fridge magnet introduced by the museum recreates the celestial caisson ceiling from ancient palaces through five stackable layers. Each tier faithfully reproduces the authentic zaojing structure, allowing people to display them separately or assemble them into a complete dome. The star-patterned base layer emits a soft glow in darkness, imitating the astronomical ceilings of Ming temples.

An increasing number of museums are collaborating with pop culture producers to empower their cultural product development. In December 2024, the Sanxingdui Museum in the southwestern province of Sichuan collaborated with the operator of the Chinese role-playing game Genshin Impact to showcase its cultural relics in the game.

The Sanxingdui Ruins are believed to be the remnants of the ancient Shu Kingdom, which thrived around 3,000 years ago. Among the discoveries found at the site are bronze masks and a sacred bronze tree of nearly 4 meters high.

In 2024, sales of creative cultural products accounted for 39 percent of the museum’s total annual revenue, coming in at 220 million yuan ($30.6 million).

Zootopia

While museums bring the history closer to young consumers, zoos are also developing animal-inspired cultural products to draw visitors and raise public awareness of ecological protection.

Hongshan Forest Zoo in Nanjing, capital of Jiangsu Province in east China, is a popular tourist attraction in the city, receiving around 8 million visitors last year. Its star monkey Du Du, a male white-faced saki, has become an online meme starting from 2023 due to its distinctive appearance that makes people giggle.

The zoo’s gift shop has launched a collection of plush keychains featuring its animals that come in multiple sizes and poses. While a ticket to the zoo costs 40 yuan ($5.5), many visitors spend as much as 10 times of that amount on creative cultural products. The zoo’s revenue from sales of such products exceeded 100 million yuan ($13.9 million) in 2024.

The zoo has offered over 1,000 creative cultural products. So far, it has partnered with more than 50 brands like bubble tea franchise Heytea to launch co-branded products.

The zoo has also hosted fashion shows and product launch events to reshape the traditional image of zoos, offering diverse experiences to visitors of all ages.

Fueling growth

In 2024, the Ministry of Human Resources listed creative cultural product planner among 19 newly recognized professions. By the end of last year, more than 1 million people were working in the country’s creative cultural industry.

Xiang Yong, Dean of the Institute of Cultural Industry at Peking University, told Beijing Review that creative cultural products carry emotional value for consumers when they buy them as gifts or souvenirs, which bring psychological satisfaction and the benefits of self-expression.

“Creative cultural product designers with museums need to have a profound knowledge of history, visual languages and narrative techniques. Their designs should serve as bridges to make cultural relics resonate with modern audiences,” he said.