Taiping Covered Bridge

The Taiping Covered Bridge was acclaimed as "the first bridge in western Sichuan”. It was originally built in 1742 and underwent several times of flood damage and reconstructions.

During the second reconstruction in 1764, materials like mud that can be easily dispersed by floods were completely banned. Craftsmen guided more than a thousand people to mix lime with glutinous rice paste and pound it into a special kind of cement plaster, which could stick bricks and stones tighter to reinforce the piers. The reconstruction was completed on the Dragon Boat Festival that year. The next day, torrential rain fell and flooded the river, but the new bridge remained stable and still. People cheered and held dragon boat races to celebrate this successful reconstruction.

#CoveredBridgesofChina

Wu Weiping (Instagram @wp_bridges_hunter)

Wu Weiping, co-photographer of Fantastic China: 

20 years, 400,000+ kilometers, 100,000 photos...  for capturing the remnants of ancient Chinese Covered Bridges.