Dong villages are made entirely of wood. The village gates, houses, wind-and-rain bridges, drum towers and the performance stages are all made of logs. No nails, rivets or wooden pegs are used in the buildings which are held together by tongue and groove joints.

A typical Dong house has between one and three rooms, and is usually two or three stories high; but can be up to four stories. The first floor is used for raising poultry and domestic animals. The second floor has a central room where family members retire to cool off in summer, and where the women do household chores and the girls weave. To the right is the kitchen, and to the left, the bedroom of the older family members. On the third floor are bedrooms for the younger family members, which are also used to store grain. Usually each family has its own a building, but nowadays it's also quite common for several buildings to be linked up by corridors.

At the center of most villages there is a drum tower, which serves as a sacred public meeting place. In one Dong village, a 27-storey drum tower was built in 2004. The highest drum tower by far, it has a green-tiled roof, flying eaves with up-turned ridges, colorful carved dragons and phoenix, and wooden lattice windows.

 Zengchong Drum Tower

Zhencong village sits in the mountains, 82km northwest of Congjiang County and one-and-a-half hour's drive from Rongjiang county center. Surrounded by forests and a small river, the village is like a lost paradise tucked away in an unpolluted, unspoiled natural world. About 100 families make up this small community where you'll want to hide forever, soaking up the atmosphere and the local hospitality.

Zengchong Drum Tower is the largest and oldest drum tower in Guizhou. First built in 1672 during the Qing Dynasty , the 13-storey structure is 25m high and shaped like a pagoda with a twin gourd-shaped top and a ceramic crown. On its top floor is a large leather drum, 3m in length and 0.5m in diameter.

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