The Nantou vegetable market in the block.
The creative "Vegetable Book Fair" allows love to spread unbridled.
How long has it been since Shenzhen people who are busy writing end-of-term reports, making year-end summaries, researching paper topics, or preparing for year-end exams have stopped to look at the city's scenery? Has the building that passes by every day on work changed in a new way? Has the kitten downstairs found a new base this winter?
Those who love life can always find new interesting and interesting things in the city, this December, a creative "vegetable book fair" in the ancient city of Nantou attracted the attention of the citizens, and the "vegetable market" opened in the block awakened the warm memories of the residents of the ancient city, so that the love spread wantonly.
A renovated old chair has become the mascot at the entrance of the "vegetable market", and the colorful and creative posters on the wall attract passers-by to stop, and the original gray color of the ancient city has been injected with fresh energy, shining in the warm winter sun.
As the key activity of the 19th Shenzhen "Creative December" Nanshan Branch in 2023, the Nantou Ancient Town Vegetable Market Art Roaming Program uses "art" as a catalyst to carry out capillary art activation in the streets and alleys.
The atmosphere of "art" has been perfectly integrated into this ancient city with a history of nearly 1,700 years, perhaps people can find traces of time in the mottled city walls, those ancient city towers with cornices and corners, red tiles and gray walls will bring time and space back to the old days of Lingnan, and the renovated Nantou ancient city is infused with a new culture, conserving a more comfortable and relaxed lifestyle in the city of modern civilization.
Food and books collide with wonderful sparks, and "visiting the vegetable market" awakens the old memories of young hipsters
Almost everyone has the memory of "visiting the vegetable market" in their hearts, going home to accompany their mother to visit the vegetable market during the Chinese New Year, choosing a fresh fish to cook soup with tofu at home, and bargaining with the aunt of the vegetable market over a garlic...... The wet market is the opening word of every city life.
But in the bustling city, what does the vegetable market look like? When the traditional buying and selling of vegetables is detached, how should the "vegetable market" be equated with art? In the "vegetable market" in the ancient city of Nantou, there are a series of activities such as the exhibition "Take You to See the Vegetable Market of the World", the creative life market, the sustainable life sharing meeting, the sketching workshop, the beautification of the Zhongshan Erfang vegetable street, and the art book fair, so that the public can experience the various human conditions and the aesthetics of life art belonging to the vegetable market.
The creative book fair "Vegetable Book Fair" held by it starts the journey of life with the first bite of human beings, with the theme of "knowing the food molecule", divided into two sections: the theme book fair and the wandering book car, which will be exhibited at No. 31 Chunjing Road for a total of 10 days. The organizers hope that through this food book fair, everyone can regain their understanding of food and explore the relationship between land, food and people.
At the event site, you can also see the distinctive wandering book cart. Every day, select some books, load them on a trolley and flow them to the vegetable street and pocket park, and then put a few portable benches to become a small reading corner in the public space. Through the book cart, the weekday will be linked to the wet market and other public spaces, and at the same time, more people will be attracted to participate in the book fair.
In addition to the recently launched "Knowing Food" creative book fair, there are also more abundant activities: the community issue manager program allows more forces to enter the Nantou Old Town to solve real-world problems, and the What If exhibition shortens the distance between creative industry offices and enterprises, and they all call themselves "industrial residents......
A creative district where fashion and fireworks coexist, an "incubator" for artistic inspiration, creates Shenzhen brands
In the past, with a history of nearly 1,700 years, Nantou Ancient Town, known as "the first county in eastern Guangdong, the source of Hong Kong and Macao", is the source of Shenzhen's urban development, the old and new of the ancient city, reflecting the replacement and progress of Shenzhen civilization;
Nantou Old Town is so small that it can be said to be insignificant compared to the size of the city, if you just walk with your head down, you can walk from the street to the end of the street in half an hour, and Nantou Old Town is very large, and its rich business format makes every shop a point of exploration.
Here, designers, entrepreneurs and artists have opened brand stores, pop-up stores and exhibitions with their whimsical ideas, and the participation of operators, community members and excellent brands has injected long-term vitality into the historic district, and Nantou Old Town has quickly transformed into a gathering place and testing ground for Shenzhen's cultural creativity.
Here, you can find niche record stores with a limited edition in the hands of the store manager that you can't imagine, a candy shop on the corner of the street that may have been open for decades and the recipe is absolutely time-honored, a cultural preservation building built in the Qing Dynasty has been renovated and has become the main front for the community to build a "strange temple", an abandoned clothing factory has been transformed into an IF factory full of creative energy and vitality, and the dormitory building in the urban village has been transformed into a rare design boutique hotel in Shenzhen, allowing people who pass by here to leave a brief memory of integrating into the ancient city of Nantou.
Whether it is architecture, spatial form, culture or art, any aspect of Nantou Old Town can become a research topic for related industries. Some people say that Nantou Ancient Town is creating a new culture in Shenzhen, and some people say that Nantou Ancient Town itself has become synonymous with culture.
Nantou Old Town's innovative brand and characteristic business benefit from the spatial form of "ancient city + urban village" and Shenzhen's inclusive spirit. The self-built houses of farmers and small traders and hawkers in urban villages, as well as the characteristic consumption spaces full of fashion, are juxtaposed in the texture of the streets and alleys of the ancient city that originated in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, incubating new Shenzhen characteristics for the city.
The perfect blend of speed and relaxation in Shenzhen "grows" a way of life that belongs to the ancient city of Nantou
An ancient city in the heart of a city is scarce, it is the key to exploring the past, but also the corkscrew to create the future. Nantou Old Town preserves the history of Shenzhen, and is exploring another way of life in Shenzhen.
Or in order to stimulate the economy, the ancient city of a city is often full of commercial streets, and tourists shuttle through them to buy souvenirs and pass by in a fancy way. However, Nantou Ancient City shows you another way of thinking about the transformation of the old city, and in terms of profound cultural heritage, Nantou Ancient Town has given birth to its own new local culture.
In the process of renovation and upgrading, Vanke integrates art and culture into the monuments of nearly 1,700 years, respects the original state and laws between nature, history, humanity and urban development, and creates a free, fresh, complex and diverse, authentic, organic and sustainable symbiotic space with the ancient city. Human, space, and time interact and collide organically to create sustainable value for cities and communities.
"Rather than bringing in external artistic forces, we are more trying to tap into the local design and artistic power of the ancient city. Xian Huimin, the leader of the community construction of Nantou Old Town, said that Nantou Old Town is a field where creativity and life gather, and a group of architects, designers and artists with ideas work and live here. In the process of construction, Vanke acts as a bridge, connecting the local new art resources with the existing community resources to create community content that everyone likes.
The lifestyle of Nantou Old Town is also attracting national attention. This year, CCTV's "Hello! Life" program chose the recording location here, and the guests experienced the mountains and seas of Shenzhen, made the flavor of the city, walked into the daily life of the people in Nantou, and felt a tenderness from Shenzhen.
Nantou Old Town is more like an experiment in Shenzhen's lifestyle under the efficiency and speed, when the economic and development growth rate reaches a certain level, people's spiritual life also needs to be accelerated, and it has become the "heart" of busy city people. It respects and protects history and memory, gives full play to cultural creativity, and explores new possibilities for community building, and has become a platform for young designers from Shenzhen and Hong Kong to exchange and start businesses, showing the epitome of "Global Capital of Innovation and Creativity". popularize
Text: Sun Yang
Plate making: Zhu Lin, Cui Zhichao, Liu Junwen