GUIYANG, Sept. 9 (Xinhua) -- In a mountain village in southwest China, a group of French students, entrepreneurs and architects traded in desks and studios for construction tools this summer. Working alongside local craftsmen, they removed old roof tiles, cleared damaged walls and hauled heavy timber beams to help restore centuries-old homes.
For nearly a decade, international volunteers have been a familiar presence each summer in the ancient village of Yunshan Tun in Anshun City, Guizhou Province. This historic site, marked by 600-year-old military fortresses, is home to a cluster of stone citadels known as Tunpu.
For more than 10 years, 429 volunteers from China, France, Greece, Britain, Norway, Belgium, Australia, Germany and other countries have joined conservation workcamps for the old houses, including 98 foreign volunteers, said Yue Jian, a Guizhou architect and organizer of the camps along with REMPART, a French heritage conservation volunteer network.
They stay two weeks or more in each camp, working side by side with local craftsmen and construction teams on demanding physical tasks and gaining hands-on experience in rare traditional craft skills. Fifty French volunteers have participated in the Tunpu workcamp. Among this year's participants was 25-year-old Fatoumata Camara, a student at France's National Institute of Oriental Languages and Civilisations, who returned to China this August for her second conservation experience.
"I had heard from previous French volunteers that this was one of the longest-running workcamps between France and China. Knowing that so many people had been part of it over the years made me want to contribute too," she said, describing the experience as "understanding China's history in places where people still live and where traditions are still alive."
Prior to her arrival, Camara had assumed traditional houses in southern China would be predominantly wooden. Instead, she found extensive use of stone walls combined with wooden structures, an architectural legacy of the region's military history.
Yunshan Tun is part of Guizhou's distinctive Tunpu settlements, a cluster of military fortress villages dating back about six centuries. Built during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), the garrisons housed troops, cultivated farmland and guarded China's southwestern frontier. Most of the settlements are concentrated around Anshun, less than 100 km from the provincial capital Guiyang. The extensive use of stone has earned the area a reputation as a "kingdom of stone."
The house Camara helped restore covers 128 square meters across two floors and stands on the site of a Ming Dynasty military outpost. "It showed me how far a long-term heritage conservation project can go and how much a village can be transformed over time," she said.
FROM FRENCH CITADELS TO GUIZHOU HOMES
In the past decades, broad cooperation between Chinese and French institutions has taken international conservators to repair ancient structures -- temples, walls and houses -- not only in Guizhou, but also at various sites including those in Shanxi's Pingyao and in Fujian. The Pingyao workcamp has been included in the UNESCO World Heritage Volunteers initiative. In Guizhou, the program has helped repair 13 centuries-old houses.
Yue Jian, who initiated the volunteer project in Tunpu villages in 2014, visited the stone citadels in the 1990s when he was still a student of architecture. Fascinated by the local approach to building in harmony with the terrain, Yue developed a deep commitment to preserving these historic structures. He followed advice from Ruan Yisan, a renowned Chinese expert on the preservation of historic cities, to work as a volunteer first in France.
"I discovered that heritage preservation did not have to be the exclusive domain of experts and professional institutions. Ordinary young people could also participate, working under professional guidance while learning about architecture and traditional craftsmanship," he said.
Back in Guizhou, he began exploring ways to adapt this approach to rural China. "The French workcamps often focus on large medieval castles, while traditional villages in Guizhou consist of numerous smaller residences, each with different owners and users," he said. Yue treats the whole village as "one large castle," with each traditional house forming part of it.
In French villages, volunteers learned traditional stone-cutting and masonry techniques in restoring medieval stone castles damaged by war. In Guizhou's Tunpu villages, French participants have followed local carpenters to learn traditional timber-frame construction and use indigenous tools such as ink lines, hand planes and chisels to work on wooden columns and joints. "We went to France to learn stonework, and they came to Guizhou to learn woodworking," Yue said.
For participants like Camara, the restoration did not attempt to freeze the village in the past, but aimed to create a balance between preserving the old and bringing in something new that could attract visitors and support the village. "Conservation is not only about making a place beautiful for visitors, but making sure that people living in these historic places have standards of comfort and hygiene," she said.
The workcamp also offered activities in local traditional arts, such as Tunpu opera, batik and wooden mask carving. "I've learnt much more than just restoration techniques. They showed me how incredibly diverse China is. Every region has its own traditions, cuisine, and landscape," she said.
The current repair project, funded by an architecture firm in Shanghai, is scheduled to be completed in August next year.
Local conservation efforts are also increasing. The Anshun city culture and tourism authorities have invested more than 230 million yuan (about 34 million U.S. dollars) in restoring 27 key heritage sites in Tunpu villages and used three-dimensional scanning to digitally document 1,187 immovable cultural heritage sites and 307 items of intangible cultural heritage, forming a digital resource database for Tunpu culture.
DEEP CULTURAL PULL
Marie-Georges Pagel-Brousse, president of REMPART, has traveled to China 15 times, but one particular encounter with a Guizhou foreman was the most memorable. At a workcamp in Xijiang Miao Village in Guizhou in 2019, a local craftsman showed how China's ancestral techniques can help reduce the use of electric power tools. "Guizhou's traditional joinery and carpentry techniques became a lesson for French volunteers. Here traditions have fortunately not vanished; they remain vital, especially where craft know-how is concerned," she said.
For Pagel-Brousse, the workcamps have also demonstrated the value of public participation in heritage conservation. "The presence of volunteers can sometimes encourage local people to rediscover the value of traditions that have become part of their everyday lives," she said.
"The volunteers gain exposure to different yet inspiring working approaches, and develop deep respect for local masters who command their techniques to perfection. Chinese architecture is so impressive and remarkable that it leaves a lasting, uplifting impression," she said.
"The French people I know who have been to China feel a strong pull towards this country and its culture. They travel such a long distance because they are eager to learn, to meet others and to share with people from different backgrounds. None have ever left disappointed," she added.
After the construction team finishes and heads out, it's up to the local people to keep looking after the old houses, Yue said. "Repairing historic houses represents merely the initial stage. Finding ways for them to remain part of modern life poses a new issue to address," he said.
Guizhou has carried out systematic surveys of the remains of military and residential settlements with preliminary documentation completed for more than 300 Tunpu villages, covering their history, customs and cultural practices. The scope of conservation has also expanded from individual houses to entire village layouts, traditional craftsmanship, intangible cultural heritage and the everyday lives of residents.
Some restored houses have become tour venues, heritage workshops, cafes and homestays. During the 2025 Mid-Autumn Festival and National Day holiday period, a peak travel season, five major Tunpu scenic areas in Anshun received more than 1.4 million tourists, generating tourism revenue of over 69 million yuan.
Camara noticed the change during her stay. Many old houses have returned to use as homestays, restaurants and cultural spaces. Modern sanitary facilities coexist with traditional architecture, while residents continue to live in the village and traditional costumes and festivals remain part of local life.
"Through these workcamps, French participants come to understand that China is simultaneously highly modern while remaining deeply attached to its traditions, craftsmanship, heritage and inter-generational transmission," Pagel-Brousse said.
"These projects help us understand one another better, gain greater appreciation for a country and its people, and move beyond stereotypes, prejudice and negative perceptions," she said. ■
