Similar to other traditional crafts, the skills and techniques of qin making have been passed down through generations of qin players and makers via hands-on, mentor-apprentice instruction.

One unique characteristic of the “Choi Chang-sau qin making” lineage is that a qin maker needs to create his/ her own qin from scratch: from a raw piece of wood to a finished instrument of high quality, he/ she must go through the steps of cutting and chopping the wood, shaving the top board, hollowing the cavity belly to make the resonator, sanding, lacquering and stringing hands on. Since he started his qin making class in 1993, Choi Chang-sau has been passing the torch he took over from Xu Wenjing to qin musicians in Hong Kong. He has thus reinstated the tradition of creating one’s own instrument among qin players and ensured its status as an ongoing heritage.

In a bid to be part of the qin making culture, to conduct research and to promote sharing of the techniques, Choi Chang-sau and his students formed the “Choi Chang Sau Qin Making Society” in 2011, with a mission to introduce the craft to the community and create a qin making culture in Hong Kong through academic exchange, organizing exhibitions and conducting promotion activities.

From its modest beginning as a musical instrument making class to becoming an institution, and from a small circle of qin players with a like-minded zeal to learn how to make qins to becoming a knowledge geared for the public, this heritage has made itself unique in Hong Kong.

The arts of the Guqin (The craft of Qin making) was inscribed onto the fourth national list of intangible cultural heritage in 2014.