As a conservation and education project, this social initiative aims to support the tangible and the intangible cultural heritage of Cangdong village. Apart from repairing and revitalizing the village’s built heritage, the project has established a Heritage Education Center, to carry out researches and to promote – mainly between tourists and ordinary people – knowledge, understanding and appreciation of the local village ways of life and their context, preserving and revitalizing some heritage traditions that otherwise could be lost.

• More than 30 conservation groups in the province have visited Cangdong Village and set up cultural research programs
• 15 workshops were organized in 2014 for high-school students, conservation volunteers, academia, non-governmental and governmental associations
• Co-organization of the 2014 Historical and Cultural Heritage Protection Forum
• Restauration of the temple, the ancestral halls and the watchtower
• The Cangdong Project was Awarded The UNESCO Asia – Pacific Award of Merit for Cultural Heritage Conservation on September 1st, 2015

The Cangdong Village was almost abandoned before 2011 when the project was set up. Only a few people lived in the village by then, the ancestral halls were broken and the temple was gone, no one would approach the ancestral halls to pay respect to their ancestors. But after the completion of the conservation project, people who moved out eventually returned to pay respect to their ancestors and organized a villager gathering. They even set up the 7th day of January as their regular gathering date in Cangdong village.

The project’s objective is to train as many interested people as possible and generate more successful cases for replication to help with the conservation in other villages.

As cities develop and society modernises rapidly, it is important to instil in everyone the importance of cultural heritage to preserve history. Cultural heritage conservation fosters citizen sense of belonging and increases active participation in the cities.

Support Cangdong Project participating in its volunteer program. Contact the organization for more information.