The Jade Store, Shanghai, 1930

Jade was a massive business for the tourist and sojourner trade. Foreigners developed what Harold Acton term ‘collecting mania’ in China (in those days curios were abundant and exchange rates very favourable, though a fair bit of fake was floating around too then as now). Jade was top of the list….and so the Jade Store, craftily named the Jade Headquarters and perfectly situated on Nanking Road, opposite the Palace Hotel (now the Swatch Art Peace something or other Hotel). It also ran ads with the strap line, “The Most Interesting Store in Shanghai” in the 1920s. As with seemingly every curio store, they moved premises over the years, though always on Nanking Road (12A for a while, then 24, then in the late 30’s they moved to no.80 having been blown out by the bombs on Nanking Road in August 1937). The store’s hong name, by the way, was Fon Kong Kung Sze and, as well as obviously jade, they sold silverware and porcelain objets.

To drum up trade they also published a guide – What Everyone Should Know About Jade (January, 1939), by Bolton Lee and with a foreword by the esteemed Arthur de Carle Sowerby of the Royal Asiatic Society and the China Journal in Shanghai. Just $1 Mex. Apologies, but I know nothing about Bolton Lee.