La Librairie Francaise of Peking and Tientsin

A header for the marvellous La Librairie Francaise of China. The publusher was the imprint of the great Henri Vetch who ran the French Bookstore inside the lobby of the Grand Hotel de Pekin (now “Block B” of the Beijing Hotel – aaahh, the romance of communism!!) from 1930 to (about) 1953 (I think). The Libraire had been started originally by Henri’s father, Francis. Henri Vetch (who eventually went to Hong Kong and died in the 1970s) also had a branch at 71 Rue de France in Tientsin (that’s the formerly French bit of Jiefang Road in Tianjin now).