When it comes to romance, the first thing that comes to people's minds is France, in fact, England is also a very romantic country.

This kind of romance may not be as explicit as France, but it is very real, Zhang Tianyuan once heard Li Mingguang tell an incident, saying that one year about Christmas, he came to London once, this time in the London antique shop chance encounter, the British romance carved into the depths of his heart.

There are many antique shops in London that specialize in selling antiques and cultural relics, and Li Mingguang is a person who likes antiques, so since he has arrived in London, he naturally will not let go of these places, so he often lingers in them.

Of course, his mentality is relatively peaceful, not as cynical as Zhang Tianyuan, after all, people are old, they have already experienced what they should experience, and many things are probably very clear, and if you want to be angry, you can't raise the fire.

However, perhaps it is precisely because of this peaceful mentality that his experience is much better than that of Zhang Tianyuan.

One day, he took a fancy to a bamboo pen holder of the Qing Dynasty in a small shop, and only a cabbage was engraved on the pen holder.

Li Mingguang was happy in his heart, because in his eyes, this bamboo carved pen holder is definitely a genuine thing, and it is a great luck to be able to buy it cheaply, not to mention that this purchase is very happy.

The "sweet girl" poured him coffee, and in this harsh winter, a cup of hot coffee completely drove away the cold in his heart and the fatigue of his body.

When he left, the "sweet girl" opened the heavy glass door to send him out, and the row of old trees on the road was almost bare. A few dead leaves on the sidewalk drift into the house coldly, and Christmas is coming. London is surprisingly cold and lonely. The girl hugged the big scarf and said, "My name is Mondriel." Merry Christmas. ”

This turned out to be the first Christmas greeting Li Mingguang received in London.

Although Li Mingguang is not cold about Christmas, he can hear such a blessing in this foreign country, and he also feels warm and comfortable in his heart.

Actually, it's not romantic, the real romance is in the back.

About a few years later, Mondriel took over her uncle's shop, and more than a decade later, Mondrielle's shop closed down because it could not keep up with the times.

In fact, Li Mingguang later inquired about the reason why this shop would go out of business. That's because this girl is so bad at business, she has never sold things inflated, and she is very good to customers, so that the shop continued to lose money and finally had to close.

Of course, Li Mingguang only found out about this matter later, so he didn't help much.

Interestingly, just a year after Mondriel's shop closed down, Li Mingguang suddenly received a parcel from London at his home in the imperial capital. Inside is a bamboo-carved floral pen holder.

Naturally, this tube was sent by Mondriel.

The girl wrote to the letter: "This is my uncle's treasure, he doesn't want to sell it, and I don't want to sell it." The day before yesterday, I went back to the countryside to unpack and find out and send it to you as a memory. ”

To know. Li Mingguang and this girl were just a one-sided relationship, that is, they chatted a few words when they were in the store, and then inadvertently said that they were teaching at the National University of Geosciences. And this girl sent things to China based on this information.

Isn't that romantic enough?

And this description of President Li Mingguang also made Zhang Tianyuan have a strong interest in antique shops in London. If it weren't for something else affecting his mood, he would have gone to the antique shop a long time ago.

Actually, as Lancelot said. London's antique shops are divided into several levels. The first level: a time-honored brand with a history of more than 100 years, the number and quality of Chinese cultural relics collected and sold are large, and the quality is high, which can be described as a national treasure, just like a Chinese art museum; the second level: small and medium-sized antique shops, a collection of boutiques, and a prosperous business; the third level: flea markets, mixed with fish and dragons, depending on your luck. The first two tiers are concentrated on Old Bond Street in central London, near the Hilton Hotel in the north-east of the city, and Kensington Road in the west of London across from the Portobello Road flea market.

In these antique shops, the porcelain produced in Jing De Zhen of China is a bulk product, blue and white, pastel, monochrome glaze, and colorful Guangcai porcelain, which is dizzying.

Jing De Zhen porcelain as early as the Song Dynasty began to enter the world trade channel, since the middle of the Ming Dynasty Wanli, thousands of pieces of Jing De Zhen porcelain by European merchant ships to the world in a steady stream, at that time the European high society also to collect Jing de Zhen porcelain as a fashion. At the same time, European businessmen also introduced the popular shapes and patterns of European utensils to China, so as to make the daily-use porcelain produced by Jingde Town more in line with the living habits of Europeans.

Compared with those things that were snatched or stolen and cheated, Zhang Tianyuan was obviously more interested in these porcelain from Jingde Town, because these things were not the shame of the ancestors, but the pride of the ancestors, which confirmed the superb porcelain craftsmanship of China at that time and the economic prosperity of the Song and Ming dynasties at that time.

It's a pity that the germ of capitalism did not grow after all, but died under barbaric fire, and after all, there was a series of tragedies that followed.

In these antique shops, we can see everywhere all kinds of porcelain exported to Europe from Jingdezhen, in addition to the local decorative techniques, the craftsmen of Jingdezhen are full of creativity to imitate the exotic artistic style, many porcelain modeling, painting, decoration is not Chinese or Western, Chinese and Western combinations, it is rare to see in China, and each piece of porcelain is well preserved, very clean, just like new.

Unlike some antique shops in China, if it is not dirty, it does not seem to be an antique, and naturally few people have a chance encounter like Li Mingguang. But then again, Zhang Tianyuan still thinks that it is better to be old than antiques, because if it is too clean, it means that there are more touches, and the wear and tear of porcelain is also stricter. Unless you're putting it directly in a dust-proof glass case, it's nice to be clean. At the very least, it's comfortable to look at.

When you walk into the antique shop, you are faced with porcelain that can easily cost thousands of pounds a piece. It is estimated that many people will have another calculation in their hearts: "Is this all true?" "Can we buy it back?" "How to leave the country?"

Regarding such a question, Zhang Tianyuan also asked Li Mingguang, because he had experience in this area, and Li Mingguang told him that as long as you have a legal invoice and certificate, you can bring it back to China, and there is no problem with this.

At Lancelot, Zhang Tianyuan also got the same answer.

In fact, in these antique shops. In addition to Chinese porcelain, it is classified from the items handled, including jewelry, paintings, silverware, glassware, books, clocks, furniture, carpets, musical instruments, toys, stamps, etc. Classified by country and region, such as Persian carpets, French furniture, Chinese jade, Eastern European glassware, Russian silverware, British watercolors, Indian handicrafts, etc.

Here's a real assortment of things.

Portobello Market on London's west side is located in the heart of Notting Hill. Film and television actor Zhang Tielin lived here when he was in the UK. He recalled: "I was a poor student at that time, and I had no money, so I went to the market every week to buy pigs to go to the water and fish head stew to drink. Next to the butcher shop, there was an antique shop, and I was interested in it, but I still couldn't afford it at that time. "This is one of the most famous and largest antiques markets in the world. The market is open every Saturday morning and lasts from half past six to two or three o'clock in the afternoon. There are about 1,000 stalls in the entire market, all of which sell antiques.

Get out of the flea market. Everyone took the car to Notting Hill Antique Street, which is also the place where Zhang Tianyuan wants to come the most. After all, the flea market still disappointed him a little, except for some "Made in China". Most of them are also modern handmade supplies, Liu Mengxun likes it a lot, but he doesn't like it very much.

Once you've got out of the car, you'll find an antique market as the crowd moves through a neighborhood of individual ready-to-wear stores and upscale residential areas. The stalls along the street, with no end in sight, seem to be a civilian-style visual scroll.

Porcelain, silverware, wooden furniture...... As long as there are some vintages, you can say everything. Those things, each bearing the mark of the times, are old and bleak, but because of this, they have gained the elegance and calmness after years of experience, and they appear chic and novel.

Zhang Tianyuan picked it up and put it down one by one, what he was thinking about now was not to retrace the past time, but just a kind of roaming.

The prices of the things here are generally cheaper, and it is an opportunity not to be missed to "pick up leaks", but the chances of "being fooled" are also equal. For example, when buying porcelain, you must be very careful to observe whether it has been repaired, because the British porcelain repair process is very good, and if you are not careful, you will suffer a loss.

Of course, this is not a problem for Zhang Tianyuan, his character appreciation skills are not vegetarian.

A more specialised antiques market in London is Bermondsey Market, which opens every Friday. The opening time is as early as 5 o'clock in the morning, and everyone looks at the goods and bargains under the light of the flashlight.

In fact, this is the so-called ghost market in China, but Zhang Tianyuan only heard Lancelot mention it, but he didn't see it with his own eyes, which is interesting.

It is said that this situation is related to a strange law in ancient England: it is not illegal to trade before dawn, even if you buy the stolen goods by mistake. Other antique markets include the CoventGarden Market, which is open every Monday morning, the CamdenPassage Market, which is open every Wednesday morning, and the CamdenLock Market, which is open every Sunday morning, also has antique stalls.

This seems to be more convenient than the ghost market in China, and probably the British people don't think this kind of thing can be managed.

"By the way, boss, do you want to check out the second-hand bookstore nearby?" Lancelot said suddenly.

"Second-hand bookstore, what am I going to do there, are there any antiques there?" asked Zhang Tianyuan with some confusion.

"Boss, don't you know, in fact, London's second-hand bookstores are also one of the treasure trophies. The humble shops are stocked up with countless pop culture magazines, some old visual magazines that are no longer out of print, and some special editions of novels and picture books can also be found here. The scale is comparable to that of the library's antiquities department, and the famous Mag bookstore is one of them. I've heard that there is a comic book in China that is also a collectible, don't you have any interest in collecting books?"

"What kind of mother is the bookstore far away?" Zhang Tianyuan really got a little interested.

"Boss, it's Mag, not Mom, Mag's Bookstore is located in Berkeley Square, London, in the middle of a row of four-story buildings. We have our own car, but it's not far away. Lancelot replied.

"Well, let's go take a look, I'm idle anyway, I'm just wandering around. (To be continued......)