Good Luck & Protection

Guan Gong, standing, carved in wood behind a pierced frame. Guan Yu was a general of the Three Kingdoms and became Guan Di, the god of loyalty and righteous protection, kept by shopkeepers, police and anyone whose word has to hold. In the car...

A dragon's claw closed around a glass bead, in antique-finish steel. The dragon and the pearl are the oldest pair in Chinese art. The dragon chases the pearl across temple roofs and robe hems, and the pearl stands for the thing most worth having:...

A carved wooden figure on a knotted cord, made to hang from your keys. Peachwood is the wood the Chinese tradition reaches for when something needs guarding. Peach charms hung on doors at New Year long before paper ones did, and a piece carried...

A mirror of polished brass, ringed in Sanskrit. The Cundi mirror is an object of practice, not of vanity. Cundi (准提) is the bodhisattva called mother of the buddhas, and her mantra is recited in front of a mirror so the practitioner watches their...

A brass tablet between two lions, carved with three characters: 石敢当. Shi gan dang means, near enough, the stone dares to stand. For over a thousand years small stones cut with these words have been set into walls and at the ends of lanes...

A column of brass bells on a red cord, tassel below. Bells are the simplest metal element object in feng shui. Hung at a door or a window, they move the air that has gone still and announce whoever comes in. Strung in a...

A brass bell, five coins and a tassel, made to hang at a door. In feng shui, the sound of metal is used to move air that has gone still and to mark a threshold, and a bell by the door does both each...

The five emperor coins, worn as an open band. The coins come from the reigns of Shunzhi, Kangxi, Yongzheng, Qianlong and Jiaqing, the first hundred and fifty years of the Qing dynasty, when the empire was at its most settled. Strung together they have...

A pixiu carved in matte obsidian, hung on an adjustable beaded cord. The pixiu (貔貅) is the wealth guardian of Chinese feng shui, a winged creature said to feed on gold and silver and, having no way to let it out, to keep every...

A shallow bamboo box with a pierced lid, for burning incense slowly. The lid is cut through so the smoke finds its own way out, and the box holds the burn low and even under it, so a coil lasts the afternoon. Bamboo has...

A three-legged ding in rough stoneware, with a small lion keeping the lid. The ding is the oldest vessel shape in China, the bronze tripod that held offerings at the Shang and Zhou courts, and to ask after the ding, 问鼎, is still the...

The Pixiu (貓貚), wealth guardian of Chinese feng shui, cast in titanium steel. A winged creature said to feed on gold and silver and, having no way to release what it takes in, to keep every bit of fortune it draws toward its wearer....

A round mirror for the Cundi practice, gilt on both faces. Cundi (準提) is the bodhisattva called the mother of seven kotis of buddhas, shown with eighteen arms, each hand holding an implement of the practice. Her mantra has been recited in Chinese Buddhism...

Cundi's mirror, cast in brass at sixteen centimetres across. A brass mirror is the old kind, polished metal rather than silvered glass, and this one is made for the Cundi practice: the lettering runs in Sanskrit around the rim, the bodhisattva's image is on...

An obsidian octagon, the taiji at its centre and the eight trigrams around it. The bagua is the guarding symbol of feng shui, eight trigrams set around the still point where yin turns into yang. Carved in obsidian it borrows the stone's own reputation,...

The peach wood sword hangs on the wall and is never drawn. In Chinese tradition peach is the wood that keeps a threshold. The earliest door charms were peach boards, the door gods were painted on peach, and a sword carved from it became...

Your zodiac animal on cinnabar red, in a brass case that turns. Cinnabar is the red mineral Chinese tradition has used for protection for longer than it has used ink, ground into the pigment of temple doors and the paste under a seal. Here...

Five brass bells under a pagoda roof, hung from a bagua. In feng shui the wind chime is a metal element object, and metal is the element that moves things along. Hung where air passes, a doorway, a window, the end of a corridor,...

A sword of peachwood with a dragon along the blade and a red tassel. The peachwood sword is the Taoist priest's tool, the one carried into a house that needs clearing. Peach is the wood the tradition holds that spirits will not cross, which...

A glass gourd filled with gold leaf, standing on a black base. The hulu (葫芦) is the calabash gourd, narrow at the neck and wide in the belly, and it has been kept in Chinese homes for the simple reason that whatever goes in...