Good Luck & Protection

A wolf's fang carved in obsidian, a dragon's head cut into the root. A wolf tooth has been worn in China for luck and protection since long before anyone carved one from stone, a hunter's token handed to children to keep them bold. This...

The Buddha in profile, carved into a slab of black obsidian. Obsidian is volcanic glass, formed where molten rock meets cold air, and long kept for grounding and protection. Carved with the face of Shakyamuni, eyes lowered and mouth at rest, it is worn...

Half a face of the Buddha, carved into obsidian clear enough to see through. Ice obsidian is the translucent form of the volcanic glass, smoky brown where ordinary obsidian is black, and it is carved thin here so the light comes through the cheek....

A brass zodiac disc, a turning coin set into its back. The twelve animals each take a year in turn, and carrying your own has been a habit in Chinese households for a long time, most of all in the year it comes round...

The beckoning cat, eyes squeezed shut in a grin, paw waving on sunlight. Maneki-neko started in the shops of Edo Japan and has sat by tills across East Asia ever since, one paw raised to call people in through the door. This one wears...

The six-pointed star, two triangles interlaced, cast in titanium steel. One triangle points up, one points down, and where they lock together they make a single form. Across many traditions the hexagram has stood for the meeting of opposites: heaven and earth, fire and...

The two-faced Buddha, one face serene and one wrathful, cast in titanium steel. In Buddhist art the calm face and the fierce face are two expressions of the same care. The serene half is compassion, the patience that waits and forgives. The wrathful half...

The Heart Sutra, carved in full around a cylinder of obsidian. The Heart Sutra is the shortest of the great Buddhist texts, some 260 characters that can be chanted in a minute, and it has been copied, carried and recited for over a thousand...

A pixiu crouched on a ruyi, carved from one piece of obsidian. The pixiu (貔貝) is the wealth guardian that takes fortune in and has no way to let it go. The ruyi (如意) it rests on is the curled sceptre whose name means...

A red cord braided in the vajra knot, with a small obsidian hulu. The red string is the oldest protective charm in Chinese dress, tied on at a birth year, a wedding, or the start of something uncertain. The hulu (葫芦), the calabash gourd,...

The laughing Buddha, carved in black obsidian. He is Budai, the wandering monk of Chinese folk tradition, taken as a form of Maitreya, the Buddha still to come. The open mouth and the bare belly are the whole point. He is kept for good...

A dragon in obsidian, rising through cloud over the sea. The carving is the old motif of the dragon over the four seas, 龙腾四海, the creature of the east and of rain, kept for ambition, authority and rising standing. The figure is polished to...

A dragon coiled across a tablet of smoky, see-through obsidian. The dragon is the one creature in the Chinese zodiac that never lived, and the only one that ranks with emperors. It stands for ambition, authority and the kind of luck that comes to...

A pixiu carved in polished obsidian, hung on a 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 bit...

The guardian of your birth year, carved in translucent obsidian. In Chinese Buddhist tradition each of the twelve animals is watched over by one of eight Buddhas and bodhisattvas, the benmingfo (本命佛), and the custom is to wear your own. Thousand-armed Guanyin for the...

The guardian of your birth year, carved in translucent obsidian. In Chinese Buddhist tradition each of the twelve animals is watched over by one of eight Buddhas and bodhisattvas, the benmingfo (本命佛), and the custom is to wear your own. Thousand-armed Guanyin for the...

A gold pixiu (貔貅) on a silver band that turns. The pixiu 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 again, to keep every piece of...

The guardian buddha for your birth year, carved in obsidian. In Chinese Buddhist tradition each of the twelve animals is watched over by one of eight figures: Thousand-armed Guan Yin for the rat, Akasagarbha for the ox and tiger, Manjushri for the rabbit, Samantabhadra...

The guardian buddha for your birth year, carved in obsidian. In Chinese Buddhist tradition each of the twelve animals is watched over by one of eight figures: Thousand-armed Guan Yin for the rat, Akasagarbha for the ox and tiger, Manjushri for the rabbit, Samantabhadra...

The guardian buddha for your birth year, carved in obsidian. In Chinese Buddhist tradition each of the twelve animals is watched over by one of eight figures: Thousand-armed Guan Yin for the rat, Akasagarbha for the ox and tiger, Manjushri for the rabbit, Samantabhadra...