Aerial view shows the Hangzhou branch of the China's National Archives of Publications and Culture in Hangzhou, east China's Zhejiang Province, Aug. 1, 2022. (Photo: China News Service/Wang Gang)

Typically, most museums worldwide are closed on Mondays. However, Hangzhou in East China's Zhejiang Province adjusts the opening hours for 52 municipal state-owned museums and implements staggered and categorized opening hours starting on July 31, as museum fever spreads in Hangzhou, according to official Wechat account of the Hangzhou Municipal Bureau of Landscape and Cultural Heritage. 

Meanwhile, many museums around China have been adjusting their opening hours recently, for example, the Palace Museum and National Museum of China. However, from a large area, multi-level and the city level, to adjust the opening hours of the museum, Hangzhou is the first city to break the international tradition of "closed on Monday."

On July 14, the National Cultural Heritage Administration specifically issued a notice, emphasizing key venues and popular venues should meet the public's demand for visits to a greater extent by appropriately extending the opening hours according to the actual situation.

Hangzhou Municipal Bureau of Landscape and Cultural Heritage categorized museums with the reality of Hangzhou's museums, the preliminary public opinion survey and in accordance with the daily opening of the financial input required, the size of the venue, the number of cultural relics and other criteria. 

There were 52 municipal state-owned museums in Hangzhou which have adjusted to three categories, namely, open every day, closed on Tuesdays and closed on Mondays.

Among the 52 museums, Hangzhou Museum, Hangzhou Arts and Crafts Museum and 15 other museums closed on Tuesdays, Yue Fei Memorial Museum, The 1911 Revolution museum and others are open every day, while the rest of the museums, including municipal state-owned museums, are still closed on Mondays. 

With the revival of Chinese outstanding culture and the general public and tourists' identification with traditional culture, museum fever has continued to rise in recent years. 

"We hope to meet the people's increasing demand for history and cultural relics and to ensure people can visit museums every day, which is the reason for adjusting the opening hours," Chen Jiaoyan, an employee in the department of Communication and Education of Hangzhou Museum, told the Global Times on Monday. 

While today is the first day that Hangzhou adjusts the museums' opening hours , many tourists still do not know the promulgation of this policy, but as of 12:00 noon, "the flow of visitors had reached more than 4,000 which totally surprised me," Chen noted. 

The tradition of "closed on Mondays" has been deeply rooted in people's minds, although the change may trigger dissatisfaction among the public and tourists, "we have received feedback that many citizens and tourists have noted the adjustment of the museum time changes, and we will pay more attention to listening to public opinion during the trial run of the adjustments," Chen said. 

Hangzhou Museum shows Hangzhou's historical changes and collection of artifacts. It is not only a national first-grade museum but also a base for patriotic education and popular education in Zhejiang Province. 

Among them, the treasure of the museum is a crystal cup from the Warring States (475BC-221BC) period, which was included in the list of 64 pieces (groups) of precious cultural relics, all of which have been prohibited from being exhibited abroad by the National Cultural Heritage Administration in 2002.