Thai craftmanship at its finest: Top 4 Thai craft to explore

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Did you know that Thailand is also famous for its arts and crafts? You can see Thai art not only in temple designs but also in their handicrafts, wooden crafts, pottery, lacquerware, and many more. Their arts and crafts have been passed down generation to generation. In Chiang Mai, Thai artisans preserved their handicraft skills to keep Thai arts and crafts alive.

So we traveled 12 hours from Bangkok to Chiang Mai to learn more about Thai arts and crafts through the various handicraft factories in Sankamphaeng District. We watched artisans put together colorful hand-painted paper umbrellas in Borsang village; got a glimpse of the traditional Thai method of Celadon (greenstone) production at the House of Celadon; witness craftsmen carved beautiful designs in wooden crafts, and learned the nitty-gritty of lacquerware art techniques.

Borsang Paper Umbrella

Borsang village specializes in paper umbrella-making craft. Here you can watch the craftsmen and women putting together umbrellas from scratch, from frame-making to the finished products displayed in the showroom and shops..

Entrance to the umbrella factory

The frame of the umbrella is made from santol wood

A frame of the umbrella

The finished product

Celadon Production

Celadon (greenstone) is one of the three main types of ceramics in Thailand. Accordingly, the name celadon is derived from two Sanskrit words: "SILA" which means stone, and "DHARA" which means green.

Wooden Crafts

Chiang Mai is also famous for its wooden crafts and hand-carved furniture made of teak and rosewood. According to our tour guide, the expertise of Thai woodcarvers is handed down from generation to generation. So if you are into high-quality and meticulously designed furniture to decorate your house, then you should include Chiang Mai in your travel bucket list to Thailand.

Lacquerware

Lacquerware was originally used to preserve silk but it is now considered collectible and house decorations. In the factory of lacquerware, we were oriented on the origin of lacquerware as well as the three types of designing such a beautiful piece of art. One mode is using eggshells (eggshell painted lacquerware) while the other two are hand-painted and gold leaf lacquerware.

Scroll down to see how artistic lacquerware artisans are...