Night Shift Workers Use Fluorescent Paint To Light Up The Scaffolding Tower Which Has Become A Popular Check-In Spot In The City

On a summer night in 2023, the Scaffolding Tower at a construction site in Chaotianmen, Chongqing, unexpectedly became popular-night shift worker Zhang Wei used environmentally friendly fluorescent paint to create a "starry sky mural" on the steel pipe, attracting tens of thousands of citizens to check in at night. This collision of grassroots art and modular scaffolding not only adds a magical night view to the city, but also triggers heated discussions on construction safety, public space aesthetics and workers' creativity.

Origin of creation: The "starry sky inspiration" of night shift workers

45-year-old Zhang Wei is a scaffolding erector at a construction company in Chongqing and has been engaged in high-altitude operations for 15 years. In June 2023, his construction site began to use the Ringlock Scaffolding System, and its modular structure's regular grid reminded him of constellation lines.
"Every night when I work on the 50-meter-High Scaffolding Tower, I look up to the real starry sky and under my feet is a steel forest. I suddenly want to draw this 'dialogue between heaven and earth'." Zhang Wei used luminous spray paint to draw star tracks on the node plate and the pole. Passersby accidentally took pictures and uploaded them to Douyin. The single video received more than 2 million likes.

Technical details: How fluorescent paint balances safety and art

Material selection:

Water-based environmentally friendly fluorescent paint (in accordance with GB 30981-2020 standard) is used, which is formaldehyde-free and has zero VOC emissions. The night glow time is more than 8 hours.

The coating thickness is ≤0.2mm, which does not affect the load-bearing performance of Steel Scaffolding, and it has passed the level 5 wind test without falling off.

Safety design:

The pattern avoids the key stress points of Scaffolding Accessories to ensure structural stability.

The fluorescent coating simultaneously improves the warning function of night construction, and the worker slip accident rate is reduced by 30%.

  Modular adaptation:

  Based on the standardized grid of Ringlock System (horizontal bar spacing of 2 meters), each "starry sky" can be quickly copied to other    areas, and the cost of drawing a single tower is only 500 yuan.

  Social response: From construction site restricted area to urban living room
  Traffic explosion: Douyin topic #Scaffolding Starry Sky# has exceeded 300 million views, Xiaohongshu related notes have exceeded 100,000, and the peak of nighttime check-in traffic has reached 5,000 people/night.

  Official intervention: Chongqing Municipal Bureau of Culture and Tourism and the construction party have demarcated a safe viewing area,    added a Scaffolding Platform, and opened it with limited flow on weekends.

Commercial derivatives: surrounding coffee shops launched "starry sky scaffolding" latte art, and the cultural and creative team developed a fluorescent coating co-branded T-shirt, with sales exceeding 500,000 yuan in the first week.

"This proves that Construction Scaffolding is not only a tool, but also a carrier of urban culture." Li Wei, professor of the Public Art Department of Chongqing Academy of Fine Arts, commented.

Controversy and Challenges: The Balance between Safety and Creativity
Construction Party Concerns:

Internet celebrity check-in caused a 10-day delay in construction and a 15% increase in project management costs.

Some tourists climbed the Scaffolding Tower, forcing the company to install smart monitoring and electronic fences.

Industry Standards Blank:

The current "Technical Specifications for Safety of Scaffolding in Construction" does not cover the decorative coating standards, and there is a gray area in supervision.

Whether fluorescent paint affects the recycling of Scaffolding Materials still requires third-party testing.

Future Plans: Sustainable Exploration of Art Empowering Industry
Technology Upgrade:

Develop a peelable fluorescent film, which can be removed with one click after the project is completed, reducing the impact of the coating on the recycling of Scaffolding Pipe .

Cooperate with Huawei to develop an AR interactive system, where tourists can trigger the constellation story animation by scanning the code.

  Model Promotion:

  Five cities including Chengdu and Xi'an have piloted the "Art Scaffolding" project, which is jointly created by workers and artists.

  Formulate the "Safety Standards for Decorative Scaffolding" to promote industry standardization.

  Conclusion
  From the cold steel jungle to the warm starry sky, Zhang Wei's creativity not only illuminates the Scaffolding Tower, but also reveals the infinite possibilities    of the integration of industry and humanity. When the scaffolding takes off the label of "temporary facilities", perhaps every steel pipe can become a       carrier of urban memory.