China Printing Museum

China Printing Museum

中国印刷博物馆

Address:No.25 Xinghua Beilu, Daxing district, Beijing, 102600, P.R. China

Hours:9:00 am -5:00 pm (No entry after 4:30 pm)

Closed Mondays

General admission: Free

English tour guide service available for 200 RMB ($31)

Tel:(+86-10)81282860, 81282770

Printing goes back thousands of years. From woodblock printing to movable type, from clay type to lead type, from laser printing to digital printing, the invention, development and application of these technologies have been combined with wisdom and hard work to spread the Chinese national culture.

The China Printing Museum is the world's largest professional printing museum. It was officially completed and opened to the public on June 1, 1996.It has a total construction area of 8,000 square meters and an exhibition area of about 6,000 square meters.

The ancient Chinese printing exhibition hall is located on the first floor of the museum. It shows the origin, development, inheritance and spread of ancient Chinese printing technology from the Neolithic Age through to the Qing Dynasty (1644-1911) through pictures, written descriptions and real objects, and reveals the legend of East Asian printing history.

The modern Chinese printing exhibition hall is located on the second floor of the museum, with an exhibition area of about 800 square meters.

This exhibition hall is divided into three parts: an introduction to modern printing technology, the development of modern Chinese printing, and the close relationship between printing and contemporary life. It shows that printing technology was invented in China and improved in the modern West and depicts the rapid development of printing technology, including digital printing, green printing, web printing and other new concepts and technologies.

The Printing Light exhibition at the China Printing Museum has been held around China is such places as Shanghai, Haikou, Taiwan and Hong Kong. The exhibition displays China's long and glorious printing history, and shows the great talent of ancient and modern printers.

In recent years, the "Printing Light" exhibition of the China Printing Museum has traveled all over the world. It has visited many countries, including Germany, Austria, the United States, Russia, Greece, the United Kingdom, Turkey, Sri Lanka and Serbia. Over the years, the travelling exhibition has had very good social effects.

Many of the museum's precious collections have been donated by the museum expert consultants' committee and even some celebrities such as Qi Gong, Huang Zhou and Fu Xinian. In order to enrich the collection, the museum also actively reaches out to collectors. It has collected many fantastic printing works, from historic pottery, scriptures and ancient printed books to modern type, printing equipment and printed manuscripts.

Some of its famous collection items include runner type plates, the scroll-mounted Diamond Sutra of the Tang Dynasty (618-907)and the fine print of the Commentaries to Spring and Autumn Annals(Chunqiu Jingzhuan) of the Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279).

The museum was incorporated into the "Fourth Batch of National First-Class Museum List in 2020.

In 2005, with the support of the General Administration of Press and Publication and the State Administration of Cultural Heritage, the precious printed book Commentary of Spring and Autumn Annalswas added to the collection of the China Printing Museum as a museum treasure.