New Taipei City

New Taipei City is a special municipality in northern Taiwan that surrounds the capital, Taipei, and runs from the mountains to the northern coast. Its name dates from 2010, when Taipei County was raised to a special municipality and took the new title.

Fort San Domingo in Tamsui was first built by the Spanish in the 17th century; the Dutch rebuilt it in stone, and it later housed the British consulate for more than a century. Migration from Fujian in the 18th century brought Hokkien farmers to the Taipei basin and the river valleys around it. Tamsui opened as a treaty port in the 1860s, shipping tea and camphor from the hills. Gold and coal mining made the northeastern hills busy under Japanese rule, which began in 1895, and the mines closed in the late 20th century.

Jiufen grew on a steep slope above the sea as a gold-mining village, and its stepped lanes and old teahouses became a favorite of filmmakers. Yingge has made pottery since the early 19th century and keeps a ceramics museum and a long street of kilns and shops. The Pingxi Sky Lantern Festival sends paper lanterns into the night sky at the end of the Chinese New Year holiday, a custom tied to the old coal towns of the Keelung River valley. The Zushi Temple in Sanxia was rebuilt over several decades from the 1940s under the painter Li Mei-shu, with carved stone pillars and bronze doors.

Hon Hai Precision Industry, the electronics maker known as Foxconn, has its headquarters in Tucheng District and assembles phones and computers for brands around the world. Acer, the computer and monitor brand, moved its head office to Xizhi District in the east of the city. Fishing harbors on the northern coast, such as Yehliu and Fugui Cape, land squid and mackerel for the markets of the capital.