On the morning of June 18, the 2026 Jiaxing Dragon Boat Festival folk cultural activities opened at the Nanhu Tiandi Fire Seed Plaza in Jiaxing, Zhejiang Province. This year marks the 20th consecutive edition of the festival — and the 15th anniversary of “Jiaxing Dragon Boat Customs” being inscribed on China’s national intangible cultural heritage list.
Organized under the theme “Red Boat Birthplace, Jiaxing Enchants Jiangnan,” the main venue at Nanhu Tiandi hosted over 30 activities across one main program and four thematic sections, running through June 21. The programming wove together Jiaxing’s layered cultural heritage: Majiabang Neolithic rice civilization, Wu-Yue regional history, Grand Canal mercantile culture, and the city’s Red Boat revolutionary legacy.
Among the most popular attractions was the sachet (xiangnang) exhibition and hands-on workshop area. Over 3,000 hand-sewn sachets hung from display racks, their silk threads catching the lakeside light. At the workshop station, visitors threaded needles, stuffed mugwort and cotton filling, and learned traditional finishing stitches under the guidance of craft instructors. One participant, a local resident named Zhou Yiyuan, completed her first sachet on-site: “Going through it stitch by stitch, Dragon Boat Festival really does pass through your hands.” A graduating high school student who traveled from Shanghai specifically for the festival remarked that the hands-on sachet experience made the old customs feel accessible and genuinely enjoyable.
The festival also deployed historical and legendary figures as roaming NPCs — visitors encountering Wu Zixu could receive a Spring-and-Autumn-period formal bow, while those meeting Su Shi could join a poetry relay challenge and earn auspicious five-color silk bracelets. Traditional performances included Yue opera, Chinese ensemble music, Jiangnan boat boxing, and the nationally designated ICH performance “High-Pole Boat Acrobatics” (gaogan chuanji), in which a performer executes flips and poses atop a swaying bamboo pole raised above the water.
The Duanwu Grand Market assembled over 50 stalls along the lakeside promenade, featuring heritage foods from local brands such as Wufangzhai alongside ICH handcrafts. The festival’s Dragon Boat Bullfight — a “water tug-of-war” format where two dragon boats pull in opposite directions — made its sixth annual appearance in Pinghu on June 17, with 12 teams from government offices, townships, and universities competing.
Jiaxing’s Dragon Boat Festival tradition is rooted in over two millennia of Wu-Yue regional culture. Since 2007, when it was first established as a fixed annual public event, the festival has grown into a signature cultural brand under the slogan “For Dragon Boat Festival, come to Jiaxing.” The 2026 edition, standing at the intersection of a 20-year milestone and a 15-year national ICH designation, demonstrates how a local festival can preserve its cultural core while continuously refreshing its modes of expression.