It’s late in the holiday shopping season, and you might be looking for a few more things or just haven’t found the right gift because of a feeling of wishing you could support Chinese and Chinese American artisans or help spread interest in Chinese culture.
Our first gift guide recommends a few places around the city where your search might end and from where you and your lucky gift recipient could be introduced to new artisans, designers, writers, products, and ideas. This list is just a sneak preview of what Pearl River Mart, Wing on Wo & Co., the Museum of Chinese in America’s museum store, Chop Suey Club, and Fou Gallery Shop have to offer. We encourage you to visit the stores in person.
Pearl River Mart
395 Broadway, Manhattan
When this popular Chinese-American emporium announced it was closing its store in SoHo in 2015, many were saddened that yet another New York institution was falling to the real estate pressures. However, not only did the store, which first first opened in 1971, quickly find a new home in Tribeca, right on the border of Chinatown, it recently opened a second location in the ever-busy Chelsea Market. Pearl River offers Asian and Asian-inspire clothing, personal care items, snacks, kitchenware, diningware, home decor objects, and novelty items. For the gift that keeps giving, there’s also the Friendship Box which sends a goodie box filled with edibles and wearables to your favorite lucky recipient. The store also supports local designers and highlights collections by CYONYC Chinatown Clothing Company (website), a lifestyle brand that redefines “New York Chinese Americana”; dim sum + puns stationery and apparel illustrator Wonton in a Million (website); and Patricia Chang (website), who creates sophisticated yet adorable high-end leather goods.
Online ordering available.
CYNONYC – Chinatown License Plate. $15.00
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Patricia Chang – Hot Dog Clutch. $150
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Wonton in a Million – Dim Sum Sticky Notes. $5.00
Wing on Wo & Co.
26 Mott Street, Manhattan
The oldest store in Chinatown (founded in 1925) is known for its beautiful collections of porcelain bowls, dishes, and jars and its exciting W.O.W. Project which has empowered and brought attention to the Chinatown community with public programs such as panel discussions about the changing neighborhood, a design challenge that invited people to repurpose old wooden crates, and the 店面 Artist Residency program, a collaboration with China Residencies now in its second year, which has engaged the Chinese American diaspora with craft and oral history projects led the artist-in-residence.
In addition to the elegant and often flourished porcelains from China that would class-up any home, Wing on Wo also features artist-designed products collections.
W.O.W. Mott St. Oolong – W.O.W. has long carried tea with attractive tin designs, but this year launches their very first seasonal tea. Mott St. Oolong is the first of a series of seasonal teas that will be sourced by the W.O.W. team from different parts of China and designed in collaboration with different Asian American artists. Chinatown-bred designer, Lexton Moy, founder of CYNONYC Chinatown Clothing Company, kicks off the inaugural design.
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Double 8 Dragon Enamel Pin by Christal Sih – W.O.W. Enamel Pin Collection, a collaboration with Christal Sih, 店面 artist-in-residence Emily Mock, & Clara Lu, includes designs inspired by Chinese objects, symbols, papercut. Proceeds go towards the annual 店面 storefront artist residency
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W.O.W. x Young Jingdezhen Artists – 25-year old ceramic Jingdezhen-based artist Daojin’s pieces for Wing On Wo are highlight all the aspects of what has defined his work to date –the attention to detail, the perfection in form, and the exquisite craftsmanship. Aesthetically stunning and designed for function, Daojin has considered how his pieces — cups, bowls, and pitchers — feel in your hand and how their thin edges touch your mouth (to us, an important mark of craftmanship).
Museum of Chinese in America Shop
215 Centre Street, Manhattan
The Museum of Chinese in America’s shop carries a curated collection that resonate with the Chinese/Asian American experience and instill a sense of pride, inspiration, and fun for our community. We can’t think of any place that has as an impressive inventory of Chinese American fiction and non-fiction that could serve as an introduction to Chinese American writers and expand your knowledge and understanding of Chinese American history. For the foodie in your life, the shop also carries a number of cookbooks, including All Under Heaven: Recipes from the 35 Cuisines of China by Carolyn Philips, the first English-language cookbook to cover all culinary regions of China and Cathy Erway’s The Food of Taiwan,
The museum shop is also the perfect place for baubles, apparel, and greeting cards — some of which are MOCA exclusives — that would perfect small gifts.
Also, a MOCA membership would make a great gift.
A MOCA exclusive: aprons, t-shirts, onesies, and mugs that remind us to Keep Calm and 吃饭. From $8 – $20.
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2018 marks the Year of the Dog, and MOCA offers items that will bring in an auspicious year. Baby onesies with “Life is Better with a Dog” and “Ruff Year” are on sale. You can purchase little adorable stuff puppies with your onesie or just by itself for yourself. $20.00
Notecards, mugs, and an artbook featuring the work of Tyrus Wong, a Chinese immigrant who became the head designer for the Disney film ‘Bambi’. From $4.50 – $65.00
Chop Suey Club
81 Hester Street, Manhattan
Armed with the mantra that xenophobia is best dissipated by making culture accessible, Chop Suey Club presents the artsier side of contemporary Chinese culture to a larger audience with handpicked high-end fashion accessories, clothing (including the sexiest lingerie you’re likely to see), home furnishings, and art by young Chinese creatives around the world. They’ve put up their own gift guide, and here are some other things we think are ace.
Online ordering available.
Until Death Do Us Part by Thomas Sauvin – This clever disguised photobook from the Beijing Silvermine Project focuses on the unexpected role cigarettes play in Chinese weddings. As a token of appreciation, it is customary for the bride to light a cigarette for each and every man invited. The bride and the groom are then invited to play some cigarette-smoking games of an unprecedented ingenuousness. This publication pays homage to a tradition in which love and death walk hand in hand. $35.
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Qing – Turquoise Sunglasses – Handmade round sunglasses from ChairEyes’s signature QING collection. The cloud (祥云) and coin (铜钱) motifs add in extra Chinese flares to the scholarly round shape. $176
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Kong Drum “Se 色” Creamy White Steel Drum – A musical sculpture developed by a Beijing artist-duo Wang Xing and Yu Cen. $400
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Dada Child – Cat by Percy Lau, a HongKong based accessory design brand, specializing in avant-garde eyewear.
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Goldfish Paperweight –
An auspicious accessory for your desk from Taiwanese studio Haoshi Design. $49
Fou Gallery Shop
410 Jefferson Ave, #1, Brooklyn
Fou Gallery has nurtured an artistic elegance with its exhibitions and programs, and its shop continues the aesthetic. All artist-made or designed, the shop includes ceramics, jewelry, home decor items, and fascinators personally made by gallery founder Echo He with found objects and a story in mind.
Online ordering available.
Atelier F-Porcelain Mantou – Part of a set of porcelain traditional foods from China – dumplings, baozi, and mantou, this can be used as a chopsticks rest, paperweight, or decoration. Edition of 50. $25
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Ren Studio-Cup (color lines) – $76.00
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Chapeau Echo – Pink Beach – Hand painted fascinator base; cornflower blue crin from London; ivory plain veiling from London; founded shells and conchs on the pink beach of Bahamas; vintage flower from a second hand Iranian book store in Boston. $150.00
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HCWD Studio – Cover Bottle Opener – Stylish and functional, this bottle opener comes in three colors: chrome, gold, and rose gold
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Dusty World Pottery – Earthy Sake Set – Two cups and a carafe. $135.00