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PROJECT OVERVIEW
A FORTIFIED PLACE,
LAYERED WITH STORIES
A story-led cultural product
design project
Zhangbi Ancient Castle is a historic fortified settlement shaped by layered architecture, underground passages, temples, murals, folklore and everyday life.
Beingburg approached the site through photography, cultural research and product concept development. Together, these formed a visual and material study of how the character of Zhangbi could connect with contemporary audiences and travel beyond the site itself.
Beingburg Story Lab offers story-led cultural product design and development for museums, heritage places and cultural organisations. We translate research, photography, symbols and visual details into distinctive products that carry the identity of a place into everyday life.
For Zhangbi, the castle’s murals, architecture, folklore and local details became the starting point for a series of contemporary product concepts. Rather than reproducing heritage as decoration, we interpreted it into objects designed to be used, shared and remembered.
This approach extends the story beyond the visit while creating new opportunities for audience engagement and heritage retail. The following studies trace that journey from photographic source to story-led object.
CULTURAL PRODUCT DESIGN & DEVELOPMENT
When a story
becomes something
you can hold
A symbol embedded in the architecture becomes a visual language carried into everyday objects.
A painted narrative preserved on the walls of Zhangbi moves into contemporary objects and everyday interiors.
From rootedness, to connection, to companionship.
04 / ARCHITECTURAL DETAIL ─────
03 / ROOTED CONNECTION ─────
02 / MURAL ─────
A structure made to gather water becomes a vessel for holding fruit, carrying its meaning of abundance into daily life.
05 / WATER AND ABUNDANCE ─────
01 / UNDERGROUND ARCHITECTURE ─────
An unseen world beneath the village becomes an illustrated landscape to explore above ground.
Beingburg Story Lab creates story-led cultural products for museums, heritage places and cultural organisations, translating research, photography and local symbols into objects that carry the identity of a place into everyday life.
For Zhangbi, murals, architecture, folklore and local details became the starting point for contemporary product concepts, extending the story beyond the visit and creating new opportunities for audience engagement and heritage retail.