In September, the vast rice paddies of Xinfeng Township in Huangshan District, Huangshan City, ripple with golden waves. At the former primary school playground in Shenghong Village, a group of study-tour youths gather around pottery throwing machines, where lumps of clay spin into shape beneath their fingers. A hundred meters away, beneath the whitewashed walls and black-tiled roofs with horse-head ridges, a coffee shop emits rich aromas, a rural library sees visitors flipping through pages, and laughter drifts from a pottery workshop. This rural landscape of Xinfeng Township was provided by the Publicity Department of the Huangshan District Committee.
The "Jianpu Shanji" complex, transformed from an abandoned school building, was selected as one of the "Top Ten Operational Cases" in the 2023 Yanyu Huizhou Rural Life Aesthetics Design Competition. Investor Wu Jianbing noted, "Artistic intervention is a means; operating a beautiful countryside well and achieving true integration of agriculture, culture, and tourism is the end goal."
Located in the northern part of Huangshan District and bordering Taohuatan Town in Jing County, Xinfeng Township governs four administrative villages: Shenghong, Xinfeng, Fengxi, and Anju. Among them, Shenghong Village was listed in the third batch of China's Traditional Villages in 2014. In the past, the village was mostly home to the elderly and children.
Change began with the arrival of a group of people. The first to return were locals. In 2015, Wang Cheng, a post-90s youth, came back to Xinfeng Township from the city, starting with a contracted 50 mu of paddy fields. A decade later, his "Wang Xiaohei" brand encompasses 500 mu of farmland, a agricultural product processing plant, homestays, and agritourism businesses. In 2022, he helped build the "Cunshang Shiguang" creative camp, and in 2023, he founded the Hebang Youth Entrepreneurship Shared Community. During the Dragon Boat Festival in 2024, he led the organization of the "Rise One Meter" rural co-creation music festival, using music and creativity to draw young people back to the countryside. "Tourists' enthusiasm for a slow rural lifestyle has far exceeded expectations," Wang Cheng said. This idyllic pastoral life was provided by the Publicity Department of the Huangshan District Committee.
The return of locals was just the beginning. Yang Yingge, a Guangzhou native yearning for a pastoral life, rented a leaky old house in Shenghong Village. She drew the blueprints, selected stones, and chose seedlings herself, transforming the old courtyard into a Song-dynasty-style garden called "Yingge Shanshan," free for tourists to visit. "Courtyards shouldn't be enclosed by walls; they should have people coming in for tea, rest, and conversation," she says. Her courtyard aesthetics have added a touch of poetry to the village.
Wu Jincai, a young man from Shaanxi, joined his cousin and friends in 2020 to establish Didao Forest Farm in Xinfeng Township, serving as a farming instructor for the village's labor education practice base. At a UN Food and Agriculture meeting, he met Zhang Haifei, a master's graduate from Tianjin Normal University, and persuaded her to join him in Xinfeng, settling in Shenghong. The couple held their wedding in the fields, with villagers as witnesses, and their daughter, "Xiao Daomi," grew up by the paddy fields in 2022. "Grain shouldn't just be a commodity; it should teach city kids what soil smells like," he says. Breaking free from the constraints of traditional farming, he uses artistic thinking to reshape the value of the fields, allowing urban children to feel the warmth of the soil and experience the texture of farming firsthand. Through aesthetic education and artistic innovation, he revitalizes ancient farming civilization with vibrant cultural brilliance in the modern countryside.
Wu Jianbing, a master of traditional Chinese crafts, returned to Shenghong Village at the end of 2019. He took over the idle assets of the former Shenghong Primary School and founded the Huangshan Jianpu Cultural Research Base. Within the 3,200-square-meter courtyard, a calligraphy and painting corridor, ceramic mural exhibition, and high-temperature kiln porcelain production area are laid out in sequence. Wooden-press oil extraction, Huizhou three-dimensional carving, and bamboo weaving have become signature study courses. In March 2025, the base was awarded the title "Demonstration Base for Promoting Education of Excellent Traditional Chinese Culture" by the Anhui Historical Culture Research Center.
Four individuals, four paths, all pointing toward the same direction: activating the countryside through art and culture. In the first half of 2026, Xinfeng Township achieved general public budget revenue of 2.5445 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 17.8%. The youth creative community and pottery study base hosted three research practice activities for university teams from Shanghai and Shandong. Shenghong Village restored historical sites such as Anfutang and Yishan Bridge, revived traditional crafts like the ancient stage and wooden-press oil mill, and established four small-scale specialty industrial bases for kiwifruit, raspberries, torreya forests, and ecological rice. A total of 19 new farmers have been introduced, attracting over 24 million yuan in village investment.
Artistic rural construction has formed a comprehensive system in Xinfeng Township. Using the "Five Micro" actions and scenic village creation as a starting point, the township emphasizes a "One Village, One Brand" theme, focusing on building a main route along the X201 Xincang Road and coordinating four major areas: Yunshang Anju, Vital Shenghong, Four-Season Xinfeng, and Silkworm Fengxi. This approach transforms beautiful villages from mere "bonsai" into expansive "landscapes." To date, four rural construction salons themed "Old Villages, New Looks; Old Homes, New Stays; Old Objects, New Life" have been held, six sets of characteristic rural construction plans have been prepared, and approximately 16 old houses have been renovated. Since the start of this year, leveraging the popularity of artistic rural construction projects, over 1 million yuan worth of agricultural products have been promoted and sold through online and offline channels.
Behind this strategy lies the policy guidance of Anhui Province's cultural industry empowerment of rural revitalization. The 2026 Anhui Provincial Party Committee's No. 1 Document explicitly proposes promoting "Art Beautifying Villages," and the provincial government work report lists deepening the "Anhui Beautiful Leisure Tourism Village" construction initiative as a key task. Xinfeng Village in Xinfeng Township was successfully selected as one of Anhui Province's "Anhui Beautiful Leisure Tourism Villages" in 2025.
Looking at the broader Huangshan District, the map of artistic rural construction is expanding. During the 2021-2025 period (the "14th Five-Year Plan" era), the district implemented a total of 168 cultural and tourism projects, with a planned investment of 12.938 billion yuan and completed investment of 12.277 billion yuan. To date, 88 national and provincial-level boutique homestays have been cultivated, and the "Anhui Beautiful Homestay Cluster Area" has been awarded. Currently, there are 726 homestays, forming ten major homestay clusters including Linhu Suji, Feicui Suji, East Huangshan Suji, and Tangjiazhuang Suji. In Tangjiazhuang Village, Jiaocun Town, idle rural houses have been converted into art studios and countryside homestays. In Lundu Village, Longmen Township, a lakeside sketching base has attracted groups of teachers and students from art academies for extended stays and creative work. In Tanjiaqiao Town, an art community integrating photography, sketching, and study tours has been developed. Through the differentiated positioning of "One Village, One Charm," Huangshan District is stringing together scattered villages like pearls on a chain, transforming visitors from merely "passing through Huangshan" to "living in the countryside."
As evening falls, blue smoke rises from the kiln at Jianpu Shanji, and the fragrance of osmanthus drifts over the rammed earth walls. The "ideal state" of the young people hasn't stayed as text in their social media posts; it has grown into the real four seasons of southern Anhui. Artistic rural construction is helping the villages of Huangshan District regain a youthful appearance—ensuring that rice paddies not only yield grain but also yield aesthetics, industry, and returning residents.
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