The Origin of Kite

The kite was invented by people in the ancient China in the Spring and Autumn Period of Eastern Zhou dynasty (770-256 B.C.), and has a history of more than 2,000 years. According to legend, it took Mo Di three years to make a bird out of wood for flying. This is the earliest kite-making in human history and the origin of kite. Later, Lu Ban improved the kite-making material and replaced wood with bamboo, which developed into today's multi-line kite. It is said that "Mozi spent three years to make a wooden bird, which fell and broke after a day of flying.".

Weifang kite was originated in the early Ming dynasty. At that time, the villagers of Yangjiabu had mastered the printing technique of wood-block New Year pictures. In the off-season of spring, they used the paint and paper of printing New Year pictures to make drawings, then pasted them on the kite frames and made the unique Weifang kites and enjoyed the kite-flying pleasure around the Qingming Festival or give them to relatives and friends as gifts. Most of the Weifang kites then were made from local materials, such as sorghum straw and reed. These materials were difficult to bake and bend, so most of kites were designed to simple flat kites with geometric shapes such as "eight diagrams", "sieve" and "seven stars". In the Qing dynasty, the material for kite frames was changed to bamboo. Since the modern times, Weifang kites have gradually formed a school, with hard-winged kites as the most in number, long strings of "centipede" as the most distinctive in pattern, soft-winged kites as the most clever in skills, and tube-shape kites as the most unique in design.

Weifang kites pay great attention to the techniques of binding, pasting, painting and flying, among which, binding and pasting are the basis of modeling, painting is to make up the deficiency of the shape, and color is to optimize the modeling and shape. Weifang kite dose no stress the similarity or resemblance in form and shape. Rather, the form and shape is to express the similarity and resemblance in spirit and much attention is paid to the beauty of the pattern. In addition to the original themes or patterns, such as gledes, sandpipers, cranes, swallows, butterflies, cicadas, birds, fish, insects, and etc., many other themes are also transferred to kites, such as "Liu Hai", "the Lad" and "Beauty Canes". Many kites are directly named after what are shown on the pictures and are very popular among the people, to the extent that flying "Liu Hai" is equal to the name for flying a kite.

Since 1984, the Weifang International Kite Festival has been held in Weifang in every April, attracting tens of thousands of spectators at home and abroad. And Weifang has become the famous “Kite Capital” of the World.