With 3.6 billion yuan in intended transaction volume, 35,000 buyers, and nearly 2,000 exhibitors, the 'triple summit' in Dalan delivered a clear signal: the traditional knitwear industry is transitioning from manufacturing advantages to full-chain value advantages. Buyer numbers and intended transaction volume rose 16% and 18.5% year-on-year, respectively.
Event Background
From June 24 to 26, the 95th International Wool Conference, the 23rd 'Knitwear Trade Fair', and the 10th Textile Intangible Cultural Heritage Conference were jointly held in Dalan for the first time, creating a hybrid model of 'international summit + full-industry-chain exhibition + intangible cultural heritage festival'. This was a global first in the wool industry and an efficient aggregation of industrial resources. The International Wool Textile Organization globally launched the 'Wool Green Paper' in Dalan, focusing on regenerative grazing and traceability systems, providing a standard framework for the industry's green transition. Buyers from over 20 countries and regions, including Russia, France, and Poland, attended, as did procurement teams from leading domestic brands such as Huimei Fashion, UR, and SHEIN.
Industry Impact
The growth in commercial data is only the surface. More notable is the substantial improvement in supply-demand matching efficiency. The 'Dalan Knitwear—Brand Apparel Procurement Matchmaking Meeting' secured over 20 cooperation agreements worth 30 million yuan on the spot; the 'Chain Up Dalan, Weaving the Future' production-marketing matchmaking event added another 20 million yuan in intended orders. This means the traditional exhibition model is accelerating its shift from a 'display window' to a 'transaction loop', reducing intermediaries for buyers and enhancing order certainty for factories.
Technological changes are equally profound. The exhibition showcased functional knitwear such as waterproof, anti-static, temperature-regulating, Japanese-certified cooling yarns, and breakthrough fire-resistant processes. With the popularization of seamless knitting technology, 3D digital modeling has replaced cumbersome sample-making, and flexible production lines can now handle small orders with quick turnaround, making 'design-to-product' a reality. For Dalan's factories, this means higher equipment investment thresholds, but also increased flexibility and added value per order.
The deep embedding of intangible cultural heritage elements has enhanced product premiums from a cultural dimension. At the 10th Textile Intangible Cultural Heritage Conference, designer Wang Dong collaborated with local enterprises to embroider the unicorn pattern of inheritor Wan Gongxue into 36 original fashion pieces, with all design and production completed locally. Special exhibition areas, such as 'Knit-Core' and 'Knit-Soul', displayed works like the 'Colorful Cloud Dragon' made from yarn collages, reviving Lingnan intangible heritage in modern stitches. For overseas buyers, this cultural empowerment offers differentiated competitiveness; for domestic brands, it opens a pathway from OEM to original design.
Ecosystem and Future Direction
Dalan Town's next steps are clear: accelerate the construction of the 'Dalan Knit Valley—Greater Bay Area Wool Textile Living Room' and the Lian Tou contiguous 'industrial-to-industrial' project, driving digitalization, intelligence, and branding transformation, with the goal of reaching a 100-billion-yuan industrial scale. The results of this 'triple summit' show that the paths of commerce, technology, and culture are already open; the key lies in execution efficiency and industry chain coordination.