Taiwan · Lantern Making / Structural Craft
宮燈 (Gong deng)
Gong deng (宮燈 — 'palace lantern') is the Beijing court lantern tradition brought to Taiwan by mainland craftspeople in 1949 — now more actively practiced in Taiwan than the Beijing tradition it descended from. A palace lantern is a multi-sided hanging lantern with a wooden or bamboo frame covered in silk, horn panels, or glass — the most complex form being the twelve-sided dodecagonal lantern whose frame joints must be mathematically exact for the sides to close. The defining technical knowledge is the joint angle calculation for multi-sided frames: a twelve-sided lantern requires each corner joint at exactly 30 degrees (360/12) — any deviation accumulates so that by the twelfth joint the frame does not close. Taiwan gong deng masters calculate these angles by a traditional rule: 'divide 360 by the number of sides — that is your joint angle.' Simple in formula; exacting in execution at the millimeter scale.
Risk level: Critically Endangered · Taiwan national ICH list; China inscription (2008) for Lantern Festival — Taiwan practices independently
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