{"product_id":"chinese-collection-st-george-s-place-hyde-park-corner-qmavkarp","title":"Chinese Collection. St George's Place, Hyde Park Corner","description":"\u003cp\u003eA handbill advertising the opening of the Chinese Collection at St George’s Place, Hyde Park Corner. The collection was assembled by Nathan Dunn, an American merchant who spent eleven years trading in Canton (Guangzhou). The advertisement boasts that the collection contains “50 figures as large as life all facsimiles in groups, in their native costumes, from the highest Mandarin to the Blind Mendicant in his patched garments” along with “many thousand specimens both in natural History and Miscellaneous Curiosities”.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOne of the press reviews re-printed in this advertisement gives a good impression of the collection’s spectacle: “the visitor finds himself as it were, transported to a new world. \u003cem\u003eIt is China in miniature: the view is imposing to the highest degree\u003c\/em\u003e. The rich screen-work, elaborately carved and gilt, at either end of the saloon; the many-shaped and varied coloured lanterns suspended throughout the entire ceiling; the native paintings which cover the walls – the Chinese maxims adorning the columns and entablatures – the embroidered silks, grey with a hundred colours, and tastefully displayed above the cases containing the figures”.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe handbill is headed with an illustration of the exhibition’s replica pagoda entrance described in \u003cem\u003eThe Illustrated London News\u003c\/em\u003e as “characteristically Chinese”, the structure’s design “taken from the model of a summer residence now in the collection. It is of two stories, the veranda roof of the lower one being supported by vermillion coloured columns with pure white capitals, and over the doorway is inscribed in Chinese Characters “Ten Thousand Chinese Things” (1814).\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe exhibition was touted as “the most ample and curious” which to that date had “ever been seen in this or any other European country”. It was largely successful and remained open until 1846. In 1847 the pagoda that had been built for the exhibition entrance was bought by James Pennethorne and relocated to an island on the lake in Victoria Park, Hackney and the items from the collection were eventually sold at auction.\u003c\/p\u003e\n","brand":"Maggs Bros.","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":67908326457653,"sku":"252059","price":850.0,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0669\/0045\/9677\/files\/252059_01.jpg?v=1792728065","url":"https:\/\/store.maggs.com\/products\/chinese-collection-st-george-s-place-hyde-park-corner-qmavkarp","provider":"Maggs Bros.","version":"1.0","type":"link"}