New Taipei City, a special municipality in Taiwan, has a ring form surrounding Taipei City, the capital city of Taiwan. At the western end of New Taipei City lies the Yingge District, known as one of the largest centers of ceramic production in Taiwan.
The history of ceramic production in Yingge originated during the period of the Qing dynasty, when ceramic technologies were introduced from Mainland China. It was, however, only after the end of World War II when the district developed into a thriving center of ceramic production. In the Taiwanese market, demand for pottery and porcelain rapidly grew after the end of World War II due to a sharp increase in the population and a growing tendency to avoid imported items from Japan and Mainland China. In response, ceramic producers in Yingge, as well as those in Beitou and Miaoli, where factories and technologies were inherited from the Japanese colonial period, began mass production of ceramics by installing machines in their facilities.
Around the 1960s, many such ceramic producers began to establish their facilities in Yingge, where they could easily obtain various resources, including raw materials and fuels. As a result, Yingge developed into a production center of a wide diversity of pottery and porcelain, including daily-use tableware, sanitary ware, tiles and other ceramic building materials, and high-end ceramic ware mainly for export that is known as Yishu taoci (artistic ceramics) and Fangu taoci (imitations of antique porcelains), luxurious items produced by assimilating technologies of Guanware. During the period from the 1970s to the 1980s, Yingge’s ceramic industry increased its output to meet the global OEM demand and reached its peak. At that time, about 80% of manufacturing firms in the district were ceramic producers.
In the 1990s, when the Taiwanese government began fostering cultural industries, the Yingge District began concentrating its resources and efforts in ceramic production by defining ceramics as cultural resources of the area. Taipei County Yingge Ceramics Museum (now known as New Taipei City Yingge Ceramics Museum), which opened in 2000, has been playing a leading role in promoting Yingge as a center of ceramic production. Today, Yingge has a cluster of galleries and tourist facilities related to ceramics and continue to attract many ceramic art fans and makers from around the world.