ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Shanghai-style papercutting

Shanghai-style papercutting is like making pictures out of paper. Imagine you have a piece of paper that you want to cut a shape out of, like a circle or a star. With Shanghai-style papercutting, people use special tiny scissors to cut very intricate and detailed designs out of the paper. They make many small cuts in the paper to create different shapes and patterns.

The designs can be all sorts of things like flowers, animals, and even famous buildings in Shanghai. Once the design is cut out of the paper, the paper usually has a different color or another piece of paper is placed underneath, to show the design better.

Shanghai-style papercutting is a very old Chinese art form that has been around for hundreds of years. People in Shanghai and other Chinese towns use it to make decorations for celebrations like Chinese New Year, weddings, and birthdays.

So, basically, Shanghai-style papercutting is taking a piece of paper and making really cool pictures out of it by cutting tiny little shapes and patterns with special scissors. It takes a lot of skill and patience to make beautiful and intricate designs!