"The sparks that land on us are our badges of honor."
Beneath the night sky of Jianye Movie Town in Zhengzhou, Henan Province, a group of young girls forms the site's only all-female iron-flower team. Using molten iron heated to 1,600°C, they take on a millennium-old Chinese intangible cultural heritage.
Iron-flower is a traditional Chinese folk art with a history spanning over a thousand years. Performers heat raw iron to above 1,600°C until it melts, then strike the molten metal into the air with wooden rods. The liquid iron explodes into thousands of golden sparks, raining down like fireworks. The craft demands immense strength, precision, and courage. A single mistake can result in severe burns, which is why it has long been considered a male-dominated art. In 2008, iron-flower was inscribed on China's intangible cultural heritage list.
This female iron-flower team is made up of young girls from different backgrounds—acrobatics, dance, broadcasting, and hosting, etc. Though their paths started in different places, they came together for a shared passion.
"All of our performers can do iron-flower, but only six go on stage each show. Almost all of them have done it before," their teacher explains.
"Hurry up—the iron-flower rods are being lit!" An Jiayi urges her teammates. The young girl quickly changes costumes, rushing from one performance to the next with less than 20 minutes in between. As An Jiayi adjusts her outfit, she explains, "We change our makeup for different roles. For the iron-flower performance, the blush is usually a bit more pronounced, and so is the eyeshadow and lipstick." She stands up, "I need to go get ready now."
The four young girls interviewed—Wu Shihan, Yang Wenwen, An Jiayi, and Zhao Jiehui—piece together their daily lives amid the hustle and bustle backstage. Wu Shihan studied acrobatics, An Jiayi studied broadcasting and hosting, while Yang Wenwen and Zhao Jiehui studied dance. "We're all in this together. We came here together," they say, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
But the path they chose was anything but easy.
"Most of the promotions you see online show men performing iron-flower," An Jiayi says. "So we wanted to break the gender barrier—to build a 'female iron-flower team' that radiates strength."
To achieve that strength, they paid a heavy price.
In the early days of training, their teacher filled the iron rods with water, afraid the young girls would be too scared to handle molten metal. "We practiced with water first," they recall. "Once we could splash water up into the air, only then did we dare try with molten iron."
On the hottest days of summer, they practiced on an empty sandy field near the company, swinging the rods again and again, learning to control the angle and force. To make their progress more tangible, they started with pebbles instead of molten iron. Only when they felt ready did they face the real thing.
The first time they struck molten iron, fear was overwhelming. "I was terrified—my hands were shaking, absolutely terrified," Zhao Jiehui recalls. "The molten iron is 1,600°C. If you don't use enough force, it explodes right in front of your face. At the moment you strike, it's like launching a firework—you send the molten iron up through the hole, and it bursts in the air."
But when they actually began striking molten iron, fear was often accompanied by accidents.
Their bodies are covered with scars. Their costumes are dotted with small burn holes. "All of these are from the sparks that landed on us. Look—it's even burned down here." For them, these marks have become something else entirely. "They're like badges of honor. Proof of how hard we've worked."
The worst injury came when Yang Wenwen's costume caught a spark. The molten iron seeped through to her skin, leaving multiple burns. "After I got burned, I was terrified—worried I'd be covered in blisters, worried about what to do at night. But it was already charred. I couldn't shower. I just lived like that, slept like that, applying ointment myself." She chokes up recalling the moment. At the time, she told her teacher she didn't want to perform the next day. But watching her teammates persevere, she changed her mind. "I still went on."
The hardships of training went far beyond burns. When they first started, their entire bodies ached. Some teammates were injured so badly that they had to be taken to the hospital. But no one truly backed down. They recall how happy they felt during the curtain call that day when the audience applauded.
Even during formal performances, uncertainty remains ever-present. A rod catches on a skirt; the molten iron spills onto the ground instead of flying up. The angle is off; someone gets burned. The force is wrong; the molten iron explodes too close. Every mistake is a test of courage—and a lesson for the next time. "Next time, I'll definitely hold it straighter," they say. Their teammates shout instructions on stage, "It's off—hit it that way!"
There is an unspoken understanding among them. The first strike of the show is given to the most skilled performer, because the audience's first impression must be spectacular. "Bei Bei does it almost every time. She can go through a whole show without a single mistake." But Beibei (Wu Shihan) smiles and admits, "The other day, the rod caught my skirt, and the molten iron just splashed on the ground."
It is precisely because of the uncertainties that they feel they can pull together as one. "When people praise our female iron-flower team, we are one unit, one team. We're very proud," they say.
Before a performance, some might want a bowl of thick porridge, but they stop themselves from eating too much. "If you eat too much, you'll feel uncomfortable when you start running," they explain. They have grown accustomed to such discipline—switching roles within minutes, raising wooden rods against 1,600°C liquid metal, again and again.
Why do they persist?
"Because what we're doing is meaningful—preserving a culture, bringing everyone into the inheritance of intangible cultural heritage."
When asked to describe iron-flower, the four young girls speak almost in unison, "Dazzling. Inheritance. Brilliant." Then, quietly, one adds a single word, "Amazing."
They have not only shattered the stereotype that iron-flower is a man's craft—they have also allowed this thousand-year-old intangible cultural heritage to radiate new brilliance in the hands of females. As they put it, "We are doing something meaningful—preserving a culture, and proving ourselves at the same time."
As night falls, the iron flowers burst open again, transforming into thousands of golden meteors across the sky. The audience's gasps and applause are their greatest reward. And those sparks that once landed on their skin are no longer scars—they are badges of honor, worn with pride.
(Reporter: Kiki | Camera: Sammi, Anna | Video editor: Sammi)
Related News:
Comment