Drumming up support for Ten Drum Cultural Village
Inspired by the vast and pristine nature reserve surrounding a long-abandoned sugar factory in Tainan, the Ten Drum Art Percussion Group (十鼓擊樂團) decided to take the initiative and bring life back to the old Japanese-era buildings.
The five-hectare Rende Sugar Refinery embodies the long history of sugar manufacturing on Taiwan. From Dutch mercenaries in the 17th century to the Japanese colonial era, sugar production was a major economic incentive for world powers to lay claim on the isle of Formosa.
To preserve the historic remnants of the red-brick refinery, Ten Drum repurposed many of the existing warehouses and facilities. For example, a defunct treatment tank for bagasse - the pulp residue of compressed sugarcanes - has been transformed into a beautiful lotus pond.
An old fertilizer warehouse and a water-cooling tank were then given a new lease on life as avant-garde theaters. A railway tunnel that once housed trains used to transport sugar has also been remade into a brightly lit corridor for showcasing artworks.
Now billed as Asia's foremost percussion-based cultural destination, Ten Drum Cultural Village (十鼓文化村) offers the beauty of drums, music, and nature. It functions as a new cultural landmark, preserving the region's industrial heritage and connecting local museums and parks to better serve southern Taiwan.
Ten Drum
Ten Drum is a fixture of the annual Tainan International Drum Festival and works to strengthen the Tainan music scene. It also networks with percussion troupes from other countries and hosts concerts to promote Taiwanese percussion music, endeavoring to cultivate Taiwan into an island of percussion art one day … (read more)
Ten Drum Cultural Village
The Cultural Village is undergoing continuous renovations and expansions, including a skywalk bridge, a secondhand bookstore, and a 13.5-meter-long chimney slide … (read more)