厂
chǎng · HSK 3
factory
🏭 厂 = a cliff or open-sided shelter; the radical for factory/workshop
厂 originally depicted a cliff or rocky overhang offering shelter, and came to mean a workshop or factory built under such an open-sided structure. It now serves as a radical in characters tied to buildings or production sites.
厂 — single radical 厂 (cliff)
厂 is a pictograph of an overhanging cliff or rock shelter, showing a sloping line where stone juts out over the ground. It serves as a radical in many characters relating to factories, workshops, or things found under cliffs. In modern simplified Chinese it was also borrowed to write 廠 (chǎng, 'factory').