What's the most popular Winter Olympics design with kids and teenagers? It must be the mascots (吉祥物). Bing Dwen Dwen, a panda in an ice shell, was chosen as the mascot for the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics in 2019. Now it has been made into lovely toys and models, as well as printed on notebooks, bags, and so on.
"The International Olympic Committee (国际奥组委) has found that successful mascots had to be cuddly (令人想拥抱的) and liked by 9-year-old children, " said Cao Xue, one of the designers of Bing Dwen Dwen. "And I knew Bing Dwen Dwen would be. "
Cao's team once made three designs, and Cao asked his 9-year-old son to choose his favorite. "When he first saw it, he chose Bing Dwen Dwen, which was the final mascot, " Cao said.
Cao's team tried many plants and animals, finally going with a panda. "What can better stand for China than our national treasure (宝藏)?" said Cao, "We don't need to say anything to have it understood across different cultures. "
They faced a problem, though, there were already too many cartoon pandas. Cao's team looked at panda designs from around the world. They wanted to make sure their panda was different. For this reason, Cao thought that it should be a baby panda. This is how they got Bing Dwen Dwen's body shape.
Bing Dwen Dwen looks like an astronaut in a space suit. It waves its left hand to say hello. It has two red hearts on its hand, showing kindness and love. A series of colored floating lines around its head look like the tracks on an ice rink (冰场). They refer to "Ice Ribbon (冰丝带)", which stand for Beijing's National Speed Skating. The colorful lines also refer to fast 5G signals.
