Rethinking placemaking through rural tourism in Chengkan Village, China

The conservation and adaptive reuse of traditional villages has become a key policy priority in China, with rural tourism widely promoted as a means to achieve these goals. Yet little attention has been given to how cultural landscapes are represented, reshaped, and inhabited through tourism. This study addresses the gap through a longitudinal case study of Chengkan Village. Drawing on interviews, field observations, planning documents, and historical archives, it adopts a placemaking perspective and applies Lefebvre’s spatial triad (spatial representations, spatial practices, and spaces of representation) as an analytical framework. Findings show that placemaking is a layered process, combining tourism interventions with historical place-makings rooted in ancestral practices. The protection and use of cultural landscapes as heritage are embedded in the interaction of these three dimensions of space. Within this dynamic, asymmetric power relations enable the local government and the tourism company to dominate placemaking, privileging tourist imaginaries while sidelining residents’ identities and needs. However, villagers are not entirely passive; through everyday resistance and adaptation, they challenge aspects of externally driven placemaking. The study advances a critical understanding of tourism-led placemaking and underscores the need for inclusive, culturally grounded approaches to balance heritage conservation, community well-being, and sustainable rural tourism.