Suzhou Silk Museum


For the purpose of promoting the silk culture of China domestically and internationally, the Suzhou
government has founded the Silk Museum. It is located in the Beishou Pagoda Scenic Area, with ingenious
architecture and some modish ingredients.

There has been a history of 6,000 years for Silk production in China. During the Tang and Song Dynasties,
Suzhou has already become China's silk capital. The silk garments and decorations in the Ming and Qing
Dynasties were mostly come from the skillful craftsmen of Suzhou.

In the Suzhou Silk Museum there are exhibitions of silk products in ancient and modem times, ancient
designs of silk products and development of silk production in ancient and modern China. The great variety of silk products, belonging to different
periods in Chinese history, will impress the visitors deeply.

The museum falls into three parts, the Ancient, Modern and Contemporary Halls. The Ancient Hall mainly display silks from ancient time from the
Neolithic Age through the thriving Tang and Song Dynasties to the Ming and Qing Dynasties, explaining the silk production history in ancient China.
The modern and Contemporary Halls show the silk process and some products that won international prizes. Among the exhibits are 80 traditional
silk looms, 320 fragments of silk from various dynasties, 30 bolts of ancient silk, 350 ancient garments, and a large number of samples of modern
silk products.

Among these exhibition halls there also contain a silkworm breeding and rearing room, and a silk weaving workshop. The silkworm rearing room
simulates a farmhouse in southern China, in which thousands of silkworms eat mulberry leaves. Through the windows can be seen a grove of
mulberry trees, the whole tableau thereby indicatinsg the origins of China's sericulture.

There is also a "Ming and Qing Street" in the museum, lined with replicas of time-honored silk shops in
Suzhou, showing the important position of silk in the local economy.

It becomes an attraction in Suzhou, so tour the Suzhou Silk Museum means you are in the sea of knowledge in
silk of China. It is also an essential place for the development of the industry today and in the future.