A Long Pao, or Dragon robe from the reign of Qianlong Emperor (1711 – 1799) was exhibited in Suzhou on November 17th.
What is so amazing about this robe is that it has over 10, 000 pearls to form the dragon’s body. And each one of them was embroidered by workers from Suzhou.
It has been told that the robe was Emperor Qianlong’s present to the sixth Panchen Lama of Tibet.
The pearls were carefully selected to guarantee that they were all in similar size. Modern technology has estimated that the diameters of the pearls are between 0.5 mm to 0.6 mm.
One collector said that being this tiny, only 1 out of 100 pearls could be successfully drilled a hole even with modern technology. But workers from Suzhou had done this unbelievable job in ancient times.
Meanwhile, the exhibition also exhibits a painting that used to be the collection of Zhang Xueliang, or Chang Hsueh-liang, the instigator of Xi’an Incident. It also exhibits many great works of Suzhou embroidery, including Prunus Persica and Buffalo done by famous Suzhou embroidery master Shen Shou.
When talking about the rejuvenation of Suzhou embroidery, Director of Intangible Cultural Heritage Research Center of Suchow University Li Chaode said that two methods could be applied for the rejuvenation. One is haunte couture, and another one is to make it into people’s daily lives by mass production.
