As a senior reporter of the Simao Television, a local TV broadcaster in southwestern part of Yunnan, Zheng Xianwen has also developed a longstanding interest in the life and culture of Kucong tribe, an ethnic minority neighbouring his region in the province. According to Zheng, Kucong people were so poor in the past and their clothes were mostly made of cobwebs and banana trees leaves. However, such techniques are on the brink of extinction nowadays as making cobweb clothes is barely seen around anymore. Even younger Kucong people don’t even know about the existence of the once popular special clothes among their ancestor. Zheng once worked in the region in the 1960′s and bore a strong sense of keeping the rare techniques of cobweb clothing making handed down.

According to the amateur collector, his only collection of spiderweb clothing made of 300 cobwebs took him two days to finish during his designed trip to the Kucong tribe last November. In addition to the cobweb clothes, Zheng has also collected many living tools once used by the ethnic tribe.

Via english.cri.cn