A WorldSkills Museum coming up in Shanghai
An artist's rendition of the WorldSkills Museum
A photo of an Apollo lunar surface drill, a wedding gown designed by well-known Indian stylist Manish Malhotra, a wardrobe with patterns of butterflies and peonies made of mother-of-pearl inlay, and a replica of a spacecraft docking adapter are among the exhibits that will be on display at the WorldSkills Museum in Shanghai.
The announcement was made at an online event on Wednesday to mark International Museum Day.
A photo of Apollo lunar surface drill
A wedding gown designed by Indian stylist Manish Malhotra
The museum is being built in the Yong'an Warehouse on the Huangpu River bank in Yangpu District as a legacy of the 46th WorldSkills Competition, which will be held for the first time on the Chinese mainland in October. The host city is Shanghai.
It will have six primary exhibition areas to introduce WorldSkills International and WorldSkills Competition, the importance of skills in human growth from ancient times, skill development in China and around the world, and skills and industrial revolutions.
A wardrobe
A copy of the spacecraft docking adapter
Shen Hao, head of the WorldSkills Shanghai 2022 Executive Bureau's museum work affairs division, said that as of the end of April, 687 pieces of exhibits had been collected from abroad.
From among them, 618 have been shipped to Shanghai, including 250 digital exhibits.
A total of 3,908 sets of exhibits have been registered in China, with 2,437 of them already with the museum – 1,723 physical and 714 digital.
According to Shen, interactive installations are being planned in all six zones.
"For example, people can learn skills connected to our everyday lives by visiting an installation themed around the basic essentials of life," he stated. "An installation on the theme of lumbering is being created to demonstrate how to appropriately harness forestry resources without compromising their reproduction. It is expected to raise global public awareness about resource conservation and sustainable development."
According to Shen, shows are being planned to raise the curtains of the six exhibition rooms depending on their individual features.
China's Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security, the government of Shanghai, and WorldSkills International are working together to build the museum. It will be open to the public for free and serve as an archive for WorldSkills International as well as a place to show off skills and promote international cooperation and youth skills education.
The planned Yangpu Bridge Park
Ancillary facilities are also being built around the museum, including the Yangpu Bridge Park.
Shen said it will be a revolutionary ecological cultural park with nine scenic zones, including a zero-carbon industrial pavilion and a deep afforestation square, with half above ground and part underneath.
The patterns on the park's roads are influenced by the textiles made in Yangpu a hundred years ago.
Sculptures and wall paintings will be on display, and activities will be organized in the park on a regular basis in cooperation with the museum.
The museum and the park will be the new landmarks of the city.
