The foundry

Seven stations, one building, in a village that has cast bronze for generations

Dong Quy is a bronze-casting village in Nam Truc district, Nam Dinh province, about 90 km south-east of Ha Noi. The sequence below is the village method, run as a production line rather than a demonstration for visitors.

Photographed on our shop floor

Six of the benches your order passes

A finisher working a cast bronze piece by hand at the fettling bench — **Fettling**Runners cut off, seams dressed, surfaces filed back by hand. The step cheap suppliers shorten.

A worker polishing the body of a cast bronze censer with a power tool — **Polishing**A censer body taken back with a power tool before any colour goes on it.

Lacquer being brushed onto a censer lid by hand at the finishing bench — **Finishing**Lacquer brushed on by hand, one piece at a time, matched to the sample you signed off.

Gold leaf being laid onto a censer at the gilding bench — **Gilding**Gold leaf laid at the bench. Quoted by the area covered rather than by the piece.

A worker checking incense bowls and offering trays and matching them into sets — **Matching**Bowls and trays checked against each other and matched into sets before anything is packed.

Two workers boxing finished bronze into cartons printed with the foundry's own fragile-handling marks — **Packing**Foam and carton for most pieces, a wooden crate for the heavy ones.

Melt and pour

Where the metal is actually poured

Photographed on our own casting floor in Dong Quy: the furnaces, the pour, and the moulds being broken out afterwards.

A caster shovelling fuel into the small crucible furnaces in the melting yard — **Charging the furnaces**Fuel and metal shovelled into the small crucible furnaces in the melting yard.

A caster at the furnace mouth, masked and gloved, working the melt — **At the furnace**The melt is worked until it is hot enough to fill thin relief without cold shuts.

Molten bronze poured from a crucible into a sand mould on the casting floor — **The pour**Molten bronze leaving the crucible for the mould. One steady pour, no topping up.

Sand moulds lined up in a trench while the crucible is carried to the pour — **Moulds in the trench**Moulds bedded in sand in a line, so the crucible can move from one to the next.

Casters ramming sand around poured moulds, runners still glowing — **Backing the moulds**Sand rammed around freshly poured moulds while the runners are still glowing.

Two workers breaking open a fired mould to free the rough castings inside — **Breaking out**Once cool, the mould is broken open and the rough casting comes out for fettling.

Pattern
Wooden or resin pattern taken from the catalogue form, your drawing, or a 3D print of your file. The pattern is the part we keep for your repeat orders.
Mould
Green-sand moulds for volume; lost-wax where there are undercuts, fine relief or portrait modelling that sand cannot hold.
Melt & pour
Alloy charged and poured hot enough to fill thin relief without cold shuts. Wall thickness 5 mm, 8 mm where the piece carries load.
Fettling
Runners cut off, seams dressed, surfaces filed back by hand. This is the step that separates a solid casting from a rough one, and the one cheap suppliers shorten.
Chasing
Pattern work sharpened with chisel and punch. Detail a mould alone cannot hold is cut in at this station — dragon scales, feathers, lettering edges.
Finish
Antique patina, reinforced patina, polished bronze, or cloisonné enamel; lacquered where the piece will live outdoors or by the sea.
Inspect & pack
Dimensions, weight and colour checked against the order and photographed, then foam-wrapped, cartoned and crated for sea freight.

What you are actually buying

Solid casting, not sheet metal

Much of what is sold as “bronze décor” is spun or pressed sheet with a bronze-coloured finish. It is lighter, cheaper and easy to dent. Our pieces are poured solid at 5 mm wall, 8 mm where a foot, a handle or a crane's leg carries weight, which is why a size-65 altar set weighs about 36 kg rather than a third of that. Your customer will feel the difference before they read the specification.

Hand casting also carries tolerance, and we would rather publish ours than argue about it after your container lands. Across a five-piece set, ±1–3 cm is normal. More than 5 cm on a single piece is a fault and we re-cast it. What matters more than any absolute figure is proportion: the cranes should stand 5–7 cm taller than the censer and the candlesticks 12–15 cm shorter, so the set reads correctly on a shelf.

Visiting

The workshop is about two hours by car from Ha Noi and can be combined with our showrooms in Nam Dinh, Ha Noi and Hai Phong. Buyers who cannot travel can ask for filmed inspection of their order before it ships, or appoint a third-party inspector — we have no objection to either.

Straight answer

We do not hold BSCI, ISO or similar third-party audit certificates, and we will not claim them. If your buying programme requires an audited supplier, tell us at the enquiry stage and we will say plainly whether we can meet it rather than waste your time.

Capacity, shown rather than claimed

What one production run looks like on the floor

We publish no headcount and no annual tonnage, because we cannot prove either to you from here. What we can show you is the floor itself.

The polishing room: several workers at buffing motors with trays of cast bowls beside them — **The polishing room**Bench after bench of buffing motors, each with its own extraction port. Volume here is people, not machines.

Workers fitting lotus tops to crane-and-tortoise pairs beside cartons marked with the item code — **Assembly**Lotus tops fitted to crane-and-tortoise pairs. The cartons behind are marked with the item code, so a mixed order stays sorted from the floor to your warehouse.

Finished bronze candlesticks staged in rows on the workshop floor — **Candlesticks, one run**A single run staged on the floor. This is what a line item on your order looks like before it is packed.

Crane-and-tortoise pairs staged in rows before finishing — **Cranes waiting on finishing**Crane-and-tortoise pairs cast and waiting their turn at the patina bench.

The warehouse floor: censers laid out in size order beside cartons marked by item and size — **Laid out by size**Censers set out in size order for checking. Cartons are printed by item and size rather than labelled by hand at the last minute.

The packing area: censers with wrapped lids waiting beside flat cartons — **The packing floor**Censers with lids wrapped, standing beside flat cartons.

What these photographs do not show

Every picture on this page was taken in our own workshop: the casting yard, the finishing benches and the packing floor. We have not yet photographed the pattern shop, and we are not going to illustrate it with somebody else's. You are welcome to come and watch a pour in person, or to ask for your own order on video before it ships.

Seven stations, one building, in a village that has cast bronze for generations

Six of the benches your order passes

Where the metal is actually poured

Pattern

Mould

Melt & pour

Fettling

Chasing

Finish

Inspect & pack

Solid casting, not sheet metal

Visiting

What one production run looks like on the floor

Guides that answer the next question

Tolerances in hand casting: what is normal and what is a defect

Bronze, brass and copper: what you are actually buying

Pre-shipment inspection of a bronze order from Vietnam

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