The Qiezhai Bag: From Houpi Shiku to Paris, How a Commoner’s Tote Was Recognized by the World

30-Second Overview: On July 27, 2024, at the Taiwan Pavilion of the Cultural Olympiad in La Villette, Paris, 500 Qiezhai bags filled with Taiwanese snacks were handed to the audience; they were distributed within an hour, with approximately 4,000 attendees that evening. ¹ The story of this red, blue, and green striped tote, however, does not begin in Paris. It starts in Houpi, Tainan, where rural craftsmanship dried, flattened, and wove bulrushes into "grass bags." ² It was rediscovered not merely for its retro appeal, but because it brought a life history that was not particularly refined yet sufficiently durable into contemporary design language.

Watch: Red, blue, and green striped Qiezhai bags at the Paris Cultural Olympiad site

Image: Provided by the Ministry of Culture, published in 《alive Taiwan》. Audience members carry the red, blue, and green striped Qiezhai bags.

This photograph fills in a detail often obscured by the "Taiwanese LV" moniker: the power of the Qiezhai bag lies not in how much it resembles a luxury good when placed alone in a showcase, but in its immediate recognizability when carried, filled with items, and standing with friends. The red, blue, and green stripes did not fade into the background on the Paris stage; instead, they brought the everyday feel of markets and grocery stores into a transnational cultural setting. ¹

One Hour in Paris, Filled in a Bag Without Pretense

On July 27, 2024, it was raining in La Villette, Paris. An hour before the opening of the Taiwan Pavilion for the Cultural Olympiad, a queue had already formed at the entrance; approximately 4,000 audience members attended on the first night. The 500 Qiezhai bag gift packs prepared by the organizers, containing Taiwanese beer, small cream puffs, and bubble milk tea ice cream, were distributed within an hour after the doors opened. ¹

Watch: Opening scene of the Taiwan Pavilion at the Paris Cultural Olympiad in La Villette

Image: Ministry of Culture. Opening scene of the Taiwan Pavilion at the Paris Cultural Olympiad.

This scene is easily written as "Auntie’s grocery bag conquers Paris." But writing it that way flattens the most important aspect of the Qiezhai bag: it was not brought to Paris to look like a luxury good. The mesh body, handles, and red-blue-green stripes were not hidden; it remained a daily item that could hold things, be carried, get wet, and withstand dirt. The Cultural Olympiad included it in the gift pack precisely to let an ordinary tote serve as an entry point for recognizing Taiwan. ¹

The Taiwan Pavilion was never just a product showcase. An English press release noted that the project gathered 22 performance troupes and over 120 participants, arranging nearly 60 music, drama, and dance performances. ³ In this context, the Qiezhai bag was not a souvenir pushed onto the stage alone, but a civilian symbol listed alongside temple courtyards, banquet tables, and performances: first carried in hand, then sparking curiosity about its origin.

Shiku in Houpi, Pressing Grass into a Carryable Bag

Its origin lies in Houpi, Tainan. Local government records state that Houpi became a hub for the weaving industry due to the growth of bulrushes; local farmers made bulrush into tote bags, which later gradually formed the industrial memory of the Qiezhai bag. ² An interview by Agricultural Media with Qingliao left a more tactile image: the triangular bulrush was first dried, then flattened with a stone roller (Shiku), before entering the weaving process. ⁴

Zhou Baofeng began learning bulrush weaving from elders at the age of eight. Records from the Tainan City Government note that the bulrush material in Houpi was wider and thicker, suitable for bearing weight, but also more prone to breaking; the process involved sprinkling rice bran to increase flexibility, then standing on the stone roller to repeatedly flatten it. ⁵ These actions remind us that the Qiezhai bag was initially not a pattern drawn by a designer, but an answer gradually developed by rural families to ensure materials could withstand weight.

It was never just a "grocery bag." Records from the National Cultural Memory Bank state that before the普及 of plastic materials, Qiezhai was used for transport, cooking, and daily carrying; the same woven structure had to meet the moving needs of a household from the kitchen to the fields. ⁶ Reducing it solely to the imagination of "Auntie shopping at the market" makes this bag appear much narrower in its actual participation in life than it truly was.

Huang Zhengxiong, President of the Houfu Community Development Association interviewed by Agricultural Media, said: "Taiwanese people's LV also started from here." ⁴ This sentence certainly carries humor, but it also highlights a contrast: a bag that once supplemented household income for grocery money and children's tuition later became an object recognizable, imitable, and re-designed.

📝 Curator’s Note: What is most memorable about the Qiezhai bag is not that it is "very Taiwanese," but that it originally possessed a design logic forced by life: materials had to be accessible, the bag had to bear weight, and it did not break when wet. The subsequent aesthetics were not added out of thin air, but rather people finally looked back and saw this logic.

Nylon Mesh Replaced Bulrush, Changing the Speed of Life

Bulrush bags and the mesh bags common today are not made of the same material. Regarding the precise starting point of the transition, records vary: Agricultural Media recorded that Qingliao switched to red-blue-green plastic mesh bags in the 1960s; the Tainan City Government placed the rise of the plastic industry and the popularization of nylon mesh in the 1970s. ^{4 7} For a daily object, this difference itself is interesting: it was not suddenly "upgraded" on a specific day, but gradually taken over by another material during the industrial changes of the 1960s and 1970s.

Nylon mesh indeed handled moisture and transport better. The Tainan City Government noted that nylon mesh, due to its waterproof, abrasion-resistant, and heavy-duty properties, gradually appeared in rural areas, vegetable markets, and grocery stores. ⁷ But writing this off as "tradition inferior to modernity" is unfair: the decline of bulrush, the out-migration of rural populations, and the disappearance of traditional vegetable stalls also changed the life scenes that hand weaving originally relied upon. ⁵

Therefore, the change in material was not a straight line upward. On one hand, it brought faster, cheaper, and more durable choices to daily life; on the other, it made the craft of standing on the stone roller to flatten grass, relying on family division of labor, gradually no longer a necessary skill for every household. The Qiezhai bag could be nostalgic precisely because people began to realize that those once insignificant actions were retreating from daily life into memory.

Red, Blue, and Green Borrowed for National Day, Civilian Object at the Center

In 2017, the red, blue, and green of the Qiezhai bag were borrowed for the National Day visual identity. Records from the Golden Design Award preservation state clearly: the design team drew inspiration from traditional Taiwanese craft weaving, combined with the three primary colors of the Qiezhai bag, bringing folk colors into the national celebration, and using woven lines to express unity across generations and ethnic groups. ⁹

Watch: 2017 Double Tenth National Day Main Visual, Composed of Qiezhai Bag's Red, Blue, Green Color Scheme and Weaving Imagery

Image: Golden Design Award work data page.

This was not the first time the Qiezhai bag was called "Taiwanese LV," but it was the moment it was placed at the very center of national visuals. What is noteworthy is not that the official sector finally "certified" the value of a daily item, but that the design choice did not alter it into something else: the red, blue, and green remained the color scheme evoking markets and grocery stores, and the weaving remained the structure of the image. Civilian culture did not need to change into formal wear to enter.

This thread did not end with the National Day. Records from the National Cultural Memory Bank state that in 2019, the main visual for the Hong Kong "Taiwan Taste Taiwan Way" market also used the Qiezhai bag as an element, with real Qiezhai bags hanging on the stage backdrop. ⁶ From the woven lines in front of the Presidential Office to the physical display at overseas markets, this bag gradually became a visual vocabulary of Taiwan that required no translation: seeing the mesh and stripes, one knew it came from a lifestyle that had long carried the everyday.

In the late 2000s, Qingliao’s Qiezhai workshop also continued in this direction. Local records cite the community action starting after 2007, while Agricultural Media recorded that Huang Zhengxiong established a workshop on Qingliao Old Street in 2008; both point out at least that this revitalization occurred in the late 2000s. ^{5 8} The workshop extended the tote into business card holders, schoolbags, lunch bags, coin purses, and water bottle bags, allowing old weaving experiences to continue being practiced in new usage contexts. ^{5 8} The National Cultural Memory Bank added that the Houfu Community launched bulrush and "Taike" bag hand-weaving classes in 2008 through a Dream Realization Project; the workshop also attempted using harder packing straps, multi-colored mesh bags, and heterogeneous fabrics to make cross-body work bags for A4 documents, waist bags, and storage bags. ⁶

The focus of these modifications was not to stick a "cultural and creative" label on old items, but to acknowledge that usage methods had changed. Rural families once needed a bag that could hold, be carried, and be replaced when broken; today’s work bags and storage bags respond to commuting, school, and office needs. The materials differ, but the problems are相通: how to make a lightweight item last longer in real life.

Being Rediscovered Also Means the Original Scenes Are Fading Away

"From rustic to fashionable" is the most convenient Qiezhai bag story, but it is not the whole truth. It makes the results of modification sound too easy, as if changing the design language alone had solved local problems. The Tainan City Government, in Zhou Baofeng’s story, simultaneously wrote about rural population out-migration, the disappearance of traditional vegetable stalls, and community attempts to preserve craftsmanship through workshops, experiences, and innovative products. ⁵

This is not opposing cultural creativity. On the contrary, precisely because the workshops produced business card holders, schoolbags, and lunch bags, the bulrush processing and weaving methods of Houpi had the opportunity to be seen, touched, and asked about by the next generation. The question is: if only the red-blue-green patterns remain, but it is forgotten from which labor it grew, the Qiezhai bag becomes merely a reproducible Taiwanese business card.

📝 Curator’s Note: True cultural transformation is not renaming "rustic" to "trendy." It is letting people know: the reason an object has aesthetics is often not because it was designed to be beautiful first, but because people lived their lives with sufficient precision for years.

The 500 gift packs distributed in that one hour in Paris allowed more people to carry the Qiezhai bag in their hands for the first time. ¹ And the Shiku in Houpi still reminds us of another thing: what should be recognized by the world is not just three colored stripes, but those who pressed the grass flat, sewed the bags, and packed life inside. The Qiezhai bag does not need to pretend to be a luxury good to deserve being cherished; its original appearance already explained how Taiwan made the everyday sufficiently resilient.

Further Reading

• Agricultural Media — Read the Qiezhai workshop and Shiku practical sites through Houpi’s fields and community paths.
• Golden Design Award <2017 Double Tenth National Day Main Visual "2017 Better Together BETTER TAIWAN"> — See how the Qiezhai bag colors were translated into the National Day visual.
• Ministry of Culture — Return to the hosting information for the opening of the Taiwan Pavilion at the Paris Cultural Olympiad.

References