The operator's programme names the theme "the pinnacle of Chinese style, eastern elegance" and carries it through the whole trainset: each public car takes a cloud name, each draws on the provinces the route passes, and the rooms continue the same design language. The details below come from the operator's published design and brand materials; the exact fit-out can vary and those materials are the reference.
The arrival car: a service bar, a tea-and-wine lounge, and a focal end-vignette where boarding ceremonies and evening gatherings centre.
Seating 48, modelled on a Chinese banquet hall: a bracket-set-inspired timber ceiling, rosewood-and-brass tables under Xiang-embroidered runners, Liling porcelain with gilded patterns whose plates carry food-culture stories, a buffet counter and a walk-through washroom. The crew's "Chinese table rites" introduction turns dinner into part of the programme.
Built around a rear Aiwan Ting pavilion set with red maple, after the Tang poem about stopping the carriage for the maple woods. Chinese flower-window frames turn the landscape into a moving handscroll, two board-game rooms and a service bar sit mid-car, a craft corner hosts working artisans, and at night a bracket-set silhouette is traced in warm orange light.
A full Chinese-and-Western kitchen with a preparation bay, heated pass and a bar and wine cabinet at the far end, feeding the dining car's seven-menu rotation.
Guests rarely see this one, but it is why the service standard holds: crew quarters for the on-board team, a staff laundry with washer-dryers, and a medical bay that doubles as the doctor's consultation room.
Twelve of the 18 cars are guest rooms in the "Yunqi" series. The two Kuanjing cars hold six rooms of about 13.7 m² each: convertible double beds, herringbone timber floors, a marble-and-brass bathroom with smart toilet and folding grab rail, an extendable child bed on request, and the trainset's largest windows. The ten Yayun cars hold forty rooms of 10 m² each: black-walnut furniture with brushed-brass hardware, Xiang-embroidered "butterfly and flower" bed runners, a plum sprig in a blue-and-white vase at the bedside, a rattan-vaulted ceiling after the stilt-house pavilions of Hunan, and twin beds that mostly convert to a double. Sizes, fares and 2027 availability are compared on the rooms page.
The trainset follows the route south to north. Cantonese flower windows and arcade motifs carry the Guangdong departure; Xiang embroidery, Yuelu Academy and the Aiwan Ting pavilion carry the Hunan leg; and the landscape framing, ink-wash surfaces and tea-first hospitality run through to Xinjiang. The exterior reads the same way: a gold-and-blue livery with a warm ink-wash band along the belt line, high-durability roof coating, and sand-proof skirting for the desert sections.
A cultural expert travels with each departure leading an on-board Silk Road salon, and the butler team runs themed activities between excursions, from table-rites introductions in the dining car to artisan sessions in the craft corner. What the spaces and the programme add up to is on the life-onboard page.
Formation and cabin figures are checked against the published references below. Last reviewed .
