Confessions from the dressing table... A little porcelain fairytale
...Once upon a Time, there was a little Chinese girl, who worked in the emperor's palace. Her family was very poor, but she had been fortunate enough to find a job cleaning and dusting all the grand and fanciful rooms each day and return home to her mother, father and brothers once a week and give them her meager wages so they could buy food. One day as she was dusting the emperor's throne room, she discovered she was all alone, all the other maids had gone to other rooms to do their daily chores and she found herself admiring the many Ming vases adorning the room, she ran her fingers over the beautiful paint work and daydreamed that she might one day own something so beautiful. Suddenly she heard, "what are you doing, you silly little girl, your head is always in the clouds, get back to work" boomed the head maid's voice behind her. She was so started that she accidently knocked over one of the vases and it smashed into tiny pieces all over the stone floor. At just that moment the Emperor walked into the room with his advisors, she cowered and started to cry at the thought of what might happen to her. She was amazed when he walked over to her and kindly lifted her chin with his hand and said, "Don't you worry, little one, What's done is done and it was an accident, so we will make this which was once a beautiful vase into something else that is beautiful also. The Emperor called his master artisans and they took all the pieces of the vase and made each of them into beautiful necklaces and the little girl was presented with this one to wear and the Emperor was was so impressed by her admiration of the gift, that he sent her and her brothers to live with the great artists as apprentices and learn to craft beautiful things for him and his family. And of course she lived happily ever after...
Chinese porcelain necklace from the personal collection of the butterfly collector.
When I bought this lovely piece, three years ago (as a present to myself when we moved to a new town, I thought it might bring me good fortune! ) it came with a little certificate saying it had been made from a broken Chinese ming vase and was about 400 years old. I thought what a wonderful history it had and now I've given it a little story too! I always get compliments on it and asked what it is! And I have had good fortune here too, a beautiful baby, new friends, nice neighbours and a great place to live!
posted by thebutterflycollector @ 8:53 PM
2 Comments:
I love this colour - wonderful!
this is a beautiful piece - glad to hear its bought you wonderful luck - and may you always have it!!
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