Ding Shu, Yixing, with over 2,000 years of pottery making history, has become the birthplace of the world-famous purple sand pot due to its unique purple sand minerals. It is also the only center of purple sand pottery making and trading in China. Life of local people weaves around pottery culture. As the only school dedicated to teaching pottery as part of the national program to develop continuing education for rural adults, Dingshu Vocational School of Pottery aims to increase the income and improve the lives of neighboring farmers, the unemployed, and the disabled by providing them with academic education and skills training related to pottery making. The school is also open to the surrounding community as a venue for public education and public events.

Unlike the usual campus of massive building and big square, the architects prioritized the unique spatial needs of the pottery creation and training process. The workshops for shaping, painting, and carving need to be quiet, spacious, and evenly lit, while the classrooms for teaching cultural history and calligraphy need to be open and uninterrupted. Creatively inheriting the genes of traditional local pottery-making workshops and Chinese literati gardens, the architects designed a low-density decentralized campus that provides a free creative environment for the trainees and artisans.

The campus is mainly made of two workshops, an exhibition hall, a multi-purpose hall, lecture halls and classrooms, along with other components like work evaluation rooms, cafeteria, registration hall, offices, meeting rooms. Each function has its corresponding space, structure and form, constituting an independent architectural block. Between these blocks, there are different types of external spaces that ensures good natural ventilation and lighting for each block. Juxtaposed indoor and outdoor spaces with different types are connected by semi-outdoor corridor with shading and rain protection, creating a rich overall environment。The landscape and the atmosphere of free communication on campus serve as a source of inspiration for making ceramic art.

Red brick, fair-faced concrete and sandstone are the main materials used in this school. The carefully-handmade red bricks and rough concrete surface cast by handmade formwork resonate with the pottery making work that happens on site every day. The school itself is like a large ceramic artwork standing quietly. The school is not only a cradle for training pottery artisans, but has also become an important local cultural site in the town. Pottery enthusiasts, artists and scholars from all over the country like to come here to exchange their skills and experiences. Since its completion in late 2020, Dingshu Vocational School of Pottery has provided vocational training in pottery to 15,000 students and pottery culture experience and hands-on practice to 50,000 visitors. The school has become a model of its kind because of the quality of the built environment and its high level of training.