During the Northern Song Dynasty, Cai Jing, a traveler of the Five Dynasties, once summoned craftsmen from his hometown to combine Kyoto palace utensils with calligraphy and painting techniques to make wood carving furniture, which was the first of its kind in Putian.
The Qintai in the Song Dynasty's famous painting "Listening to the Qin" is exquisite Xinghua woodcarving furniture presented by Cai Jing to Song Huizong.
During the Song and Yuan Dynasties, due to the prevalence of Mazu belief, a large number of statues were carved. The original statue of Mazu in the Southern Song Dynasty in Lingyingtang, Fengting Haibin Village, Xianyou County is very precious because of its exquisite carving technology and simple style.
One of them is a woodcarving lady with a "downward bun" on her head, a high nose, a plump face and drooping ears. She is dressed in an embroidered robe with a cloud shoulder on her neck. The carved lines of the characters are bold and unconstrained, such as line drawing and pleating, which is quite characteristic of wood carving in the Song Dynasty.
At the end of Song Dynasty and the beginning of Yuan Dynasty, there were many folk sculptors in Puxian County, among which the Boxwood Sculpture School represented by Lin Hui and Lin Yi had a great influence. Lin's round carving and Taishi Chen are beautifully shaped and lifelike. At the same time, at the end of the Song Dynasty, rosewood and chicken wing wood imported from Quanzhou Port and Fengting Port became the wood carving raw materials of Xinghua craftsmen, and mahogany wood carving became more and more popular.
In the Song and Ming Dynasties, Xinghua Hakka reached its peak, with thousands of scholars and hundreds of senior officials such as Zaifu and Shangshu. The building components and furniture of these rich officials and gentry's homes and various folk houses are carefully carved. Many roof trusses, beams, arches, hanging bells, doors and windows, paddocks and other places have many exquisite wood carvings of figures, pines, chrysanthemums, flowers and birds, animals and so on.