Buyers ask me this more than almost anything else: “I want something for wealth — should I get a Money Frog or a Pixiu?” The short answer is that they do different jobs. The Money Frog brings money in. Pixiu keeps it from leaving. One earns; the other guards. They’re not interchangeable, and getting the

The first time I held a Guan Gong carving, I ran my thumb along the blade. Not the face, not the robe — the blade. The edge of the Green Dragon Crescent Blade, thinned to a sliver where the carver had spent what must have been an unreasonable amount of time on a detail most

The first time we encountered a pixiu statue up close was in a small carving workshop. The carver placed it in our hands without a word, turned it over to show the underside, and waited. One piece of wood, one animal, one intention: bring wealth in and keep it. That is what a pixiu is