Tai Chi Glossary > Chen Style (陈式)

Chen Style (陈式)

Definition: Chen Style (陈式) is the oldest form of tai chi chuan, originating in Chenjiagou village in the 17th century, characterized by alternating slow and explosive movements, silk reeling force, and visible fa jin.

All tai chi styles trace their lineage, directly or indirectly, back to Chen village. Yang, Wu, Sun, and every other major style grew from seeds planted in Chenjiagou—a small village in Henan Province that became, improbably, the birthplace of one of the world’s most widely practiced martial arts. To understand Chen Style is to understand where tai chi came from, what it was originally designed to do, and what has been preserved, adapted, and sometimes lost as the art spread across the world.

Where It Began

The story of Chen Style begins with Chen Wangting (陈王廷), a military officer who retired to Chenjiagou around 1644 after the fall of the Ming Dynasty. Drawing on his military combat experience, classical Chinese medicine, Taoist philosophy, and existing martial traditions, he developed a family fighting system that would be passed down through generations of the Chen family—and kept almost entirely secret from outsiders for nearly two centuries.

What Chen Wangting created was not a single form but a system: multiple routines, weapons training, and a theoretical framework integrating qi cultivation with martial application. The system was transmitted exclusively within the Chen family, refined by each generation, until the 14th-generation master Chen

Changxing began teaching Yang Luchan—an outsider—in the early 19th century. Yang took what he learned back to Beijing, adapted it, and founded Yang Style. The world eventually came to know tai chi largely through that adaptation. Chen Style itself remained relatively obscure outside Henan until the 20th century.

What Makes Chen Style Distinct

Walk into a Yang Style class and a Chen Style class on the same day and you might not immediately recognize them as the same art. The differences are real and significant.

Chen Style alternates deliberately between slow, flowing movements and sudden explosive bursts— fa jin (发劲) that appear without warning in an otherwise unhurried sequence. The body shakes. There is often an audible exhalation. Force releases and withdraws in an instant. This contrast—man (慢, slow) and kuai (快, fast) coexisting in the same form—is one of Chen Style’s most distinctive qualities and one of its most demanding training challenges.

Silk reeling (缠丝劲) is the structural foundation of Chen Style movement. Every movement contains spiral force—winding and unwinding through the limbs from the Dan Tian outward. This is not decorative. It is the mechanism through which Chen Style generates and transmits force, maintains structural connection, and creates the continuous, flowing quality that links fast and slow movements into a coherent whole.

The stances tend to be lower than other styles. The kua works harder. The physical demands are considerable. Chen Style training builds genuine strength and conditioning alongside internal development—the two are not treated as opposites but as complements.

Lao Jia and Xin Jia

Within Chen Style, two main framework traditions exist side by side.

• Chen-style Lao Jia (老架, Old Frame) is the traditional curriculum transmitted through Chen Changxing and preserved most directly in Chenjiagou. It consists of two routines: Yi Lu (一路, First Form)—longer, slower, foundational—and Er Lu (二路, Second Form), also known as Cannon Fist (炮捶), which is faster, more explosive, and contains the highest concentration of fa jin in the entire Chen repertoire.
• Chen-style Xin Jia (新架, New Frame) was developed by Chen Fake (陈发科) in the early 20th century and further systematized by his student Chen Zhaokui. Characterized by lower stances, more pronounced silk reeling circles, and a greater range of motion in the limbs, Xin Jia represents a deliberate amplification of the internal training requirements—making the silk reeling more visible and the structural demands more explicit.

The two frameworks are not rivals. Most serious Chen Style practitioners study both, finding that Lao Jia builds foundational structure while Xin Jia deepens internal sensitivity.

Chen Style Today

The global spread of Chen Style is largely a 20th-century story. Chen Fake brought the art to Beijing in 1928, where it attracted serious martial artists for the first time outside Henan. His student Chen Xiaowang later became one of the most influential figures in the art’s international transmission—systematizing the curriculum, developing accessible introductory forms, and traveling extensively to teach.

Today Chen Style is practiced worldwide. Competition forms, health-oriented adaptations, and traditional lineage transmission all coexist. The challenge for practitioners is navigating this diversity—finding teachers who have preserved the martial substance while remaining accessible to modern students.

For those willing to commit to its demands, Chen Style offers something rare: a martial art that is simultaneously a sophisticated health practice, a vehicle for internal cultivation, and a fighting system whose principles have been tested and refined over four centuries.

• Silk Reeling — the spiral force method that is structurally central to Chen Style
• Fa Jin — explosive force release that characterizes Chen Style’s distinctive fast-slow alternation
• Chen-style Lao Jia — the traditional Old Frame curriculum
• Chen-style Xin Jia — the New Frame with amplified silk reeling requirements
• Chan Si Jing — the Chinese term for silk reeling force, central to Chen Style theory
• Chen Xiaowang — the modern grandmaster most responsible for Chen Style’s global spread
• Er Lu — the Second Form, Cannon Fist, the most explosive routine in Chen Style
• Kua — the hip region whose mobility is especially demanding in Chen Style practice
• Dan Tian — the energy center from which Chen Style silk reeling originates
• Internal Martial Arts — the broader category within which Chen Style sits alongside Bagua and Xingyi

Have questions about Chen Style in practice? Our forum thread — Tai Chi Wuji FAQ [OFFICIAL GUIDE] — Answered by Senior Practitioners — covers this and many more topics answered by experienced practitioners.