(langnghevietnam.vn) Thuy Ung horn carving village has long been famous for its handicraft products. Born and grown on this traditional land, artisan Nguyen Van Su maintains his father career to create the horn products. With the abundance, the sophistication and high-quality, his products have been favored by domestic and foreign markets.

"To stick with the occupation, must be love it"

Thuy Ung (Hoa Binh, Thuong Tin, Hanoi) is well-known as a horn comb village. But like many other traditional villages, it also faced to economic difficulty. In subsidy period, the buffaloes, cows are used for agriculture. Thus, material for production is not enough. The whole village had to move to the wooden comb, plastic comb for living and the horn comb seem to be eroded.

In 2003, when Vietnam hosted Seagames, Nguyen Van Su was chosen as the representative to speak about the craft village. In particular, when participating in “Ha Tay Craft Village Tourism Fair”, his products attract more customers, shareholders than other famous villages such as bamboo and rattan , mosaic, copper casting ... Seeing interesting opportunity, he invested to expand production scale.

Nguyen Van Su guides to distinguish Vietnamese horn and African horn

In order to make a horn comb, workers must do many stages. Each stage requires the workers to be very skillful, carefull. The making process is difficult because all horn comb is completely different from others and workers must depend on their horns to produce. The value of each is not only shown by horn material but also by the processing of workers.

With this number of horn, the cost for labor is more than 10 millions VND

With talented hands, the business acumen, and the psychology of customers knowledge  Nguyen Van Su has innovated designs, diverse product. Besides traditional combs, he created some new products such as: bracelets, rings, brooches, combs ... with different designs and styles.

The elaborate from selection of raw materials

With his horn production and Thuy Ung village scale, the raw materials from domestic suppliers do not meet. So he has to import raw materials from other countries such as Laos, Cambodia and other countries in Africa. "Horn of each continent has a different color.  So our products are also more abundant, more colorful, " he shared.

Nguyen Van Su’s inventories of horn raw materials

Horn comb is the best one for hair. It prevents and fixes broken hair, massages the scalp, maintains circulation, brings nutrients to hair roots. Currently, there are many fake horn combs on the market. Talking to us, he unveiled " to know real horn comb, the simplest and most efficient is combustion. If it is real product, it will become soft, and to a certain temperature it will burn down".

Production does not  keep up orders.

Nguyen Van Su workshop makes the hundreds of products per day. Currently, his products appear in many shops and  entertainment centers over the country, especially in Hanoi such as Vincom, Trang Tien Plaza, Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum, Ngoc Son temple, Van Mieu Quoc Tu Giam ..... His customers usually go to workshops to order. He said: " I am fortunate to have reputation in this business, so many people find to order ". Besides, he  also has a booth in Vincom supermarket and two booths in Halong.

In order to take advantage of raw materials for environmental protection, he does not waste any part of the horn. He uses the smallest piece to make ornaments, even sucks the dust of horn to be sold to farmers as fertilizer. The using all materials is both increasing income and protecting environment.

Intending  to establish a horn company, Nguyen Van Su directs his children to study finance and business. "Firstly, I will build a showroom to display best products. Then I will arrange workshops for tourists visting the horn products  and the manipulating process.”

Some products of artisan Nguyen Van Su

Ngọc Lan