Spotlight on the designs at this year’s Taiwan Lantern Festival in Tainan

Spotlight on the designs at this year’s Taiwan Lantern Festival in Tainan

2024-01-05

The Taiwan Lantern Festival will be held in Tainan for the first time in 16 years. The event’s main lantern was inspired by the dragons at Grand Mazu Temple in the southern city. The event will also give away small lanterns as souvenirs inspired by xiaolongbao, or little steamed buns. Our very own Stephany Yang spoke to the designers of the lanterns to find out more.

The Taiwan Lantern Festival’s centerpiece was inspired by dragons at the entrance of Tainan’s Grand Mazu Temple. The 22-meter-tall lantern was built sustainably using ethylene vinyl acetate and a unique form of carbon called Buckminsterfullerene. It’s also powered by solar technology, significantly reducing its power consumption.

Camay Peng
Designer
This marks the first time we had the opportunity to work with National Taiwan University’s department of green energy technology. It’s a great honor to be able to use this material in the main lantern. The main lantern will be set near the high-speed rail, at the exhibition center. The sky is very beautiful there, with not many buildings obscuring the view, so people can take selfies with this huge 22-meter-high lantern. You will definitely capture a lot of stunning angles.

Camay Peng is an award-winning designer who’s worked on lanterns for a variety of festivals. She also served as a curator for the 2023 Penghu International Lighting Art Festival. This year marks Tainan’s 400th anniversary as a city. Peng says that through her design work, she hopes to wish Tainan a happy 400th birthday and wish everyone good luck in the Year of the Dragon.

Camay Peng
Designer
This main lantern involves the most mechanical energy of any main lantern in the past 35 years. In the Year of the Dragon, the main lantern is returning to Tainan. This year’s lantern festival will be sure to leave people with many happy memories and a cultural legacy.

Stephany Yang
FTV reporter
Aside from the main lantern, there is also a children’s lantern that can be worn around the neck.

This year’s handheld lantern for children is by Lin Chia-wei. She’s the designer behind the many lanterns for the Taipei Lantern Festival. For this event’s design, she reimagined the fierce dragon into a cute, charming creature inspired by the Taiwanese steamed bun. The mouth of the dragon can be opened and closed, allowing children to store small toys and candy inside.

Lin Chia-wei
Designer
As for this year’s design, we made the slender dragon head round and chubby. Children can put their toys or snacks in the dragon and then snap up the buttons at the back. When the dragon’s mouth opens, these small toys will spit out from the mouth. I hope to wish everyone good luck with this design.

The Taiwan Lantern Festival will be in Tainan for the first time in 16 years at two locations: the Tainan high-speed rail station and Anping District. There will be English, Mandarin, Hakka, and Japanese tour guides onsite.

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