If you’ve read my story about V.I.P. Jiu 8 and my adventures in China, you’ll know that after putting Dylan on a flight back to the UK, I ended up in Jingdezhen.
Once I arrived in Jingdezhen, I quickly found myself surrounded by workshops producing incredible porcelain. I also met a lot of academics who knew everything there was to know about the ancient kiln sites. These guys would regularly go out digging for ancient porcelain shards. One guy, in particular, became a good friend. He took me all over Jingdezhen, introducing me to people in the porcelain and antique industry. Honestly, what I saw, learned, and who I met during that time is enough to fill a book.
But to keep this short—on my last night before heading back to the UK, a group of my new friends took me out for dinner and surprised me with a genuine Ruyao shard as a gift. I was blown away. I wanted to keep this piece close, so I decided to have it mounted in gold in Shanghai before my flight. That way, I could wear it all the time as a reminder of my friends and my time in Jingdezhen. It’s also a way of keeping the history of the Ruyao kiln with me, staying connected to that rare piece of history wherever I go.
A Bit of Ru Kiln History
Ru kilns, from the Northern Song Dynasty (960–1127 AD), are famous in the world of Chinese ceramics and are some of the rarest around. The pieces were made for the imperial court, known for their stunning blue-green glaze that resembles jade. What makes them even more special is the unique crackle pattern in the glaze, something incredibly hard to recreate.
Only a few hundred Ruyao pieces are known to exist today, most of them in museums or private collections. For centuries, the kiln’s exact location was lost until it was rediscovered in the 1980s, which only added to the mystery. To have a piece of Ruyao is like holding a bit of lost history in your hands.
That shard they gave me isn’t just a beautiful memory of my time in Jingdezhen—it’s a real connection to one of the rarest and most valuable kilns in the world.
