In China, the protection of industrial heritage is an urgent issue, directly related to the urban renewal. The cognition of the value of industrial heritage directly affects the quality of renovation and reuse. Based on the cultural economics theory of David Throsby, the father of the cultural economics, this paper establishes an industrial heritage value framework from the perspective of culture and economy. Integrating the various fragmentations of the value of China's industrial heritage researches, it is suggested that the industrial heritage can have four kinds of capital values at the same time. That is, the physical capital value, the human capital value, the natural capital value, and the cultural capital value. The values of the connotation (the " intrinsic value ") and the extension (the "creative value") are integrated as a whole value of industrial heritage. The intrinsic value is the original value of the heritage itself. The creative value is a newly created value after the transformation and the reuse.

industrial heritage  /  economic value  /  cultural capital  /  intrinsic value  /  creative value  /  cultural policy