In the field of jewelry, Donghai County is known as the "East China Sea Crystal World" reputation, and is an important jewelry industry base in the mainland. This paper expounds the development history and current situation of the crystal industry in the East China Sea, describes in detail the internal layout and trading characteristics of the two market types of Donghai Crystal City and Crystal Market Daji, and improves the description of the current situation of the East China Sea crystal market.
When it comes to the crystal market in the jewelry and jade jewelry industry, the first thing that comes to mind is Donghai County, which is located in Lianyungang City, Jiangsu Province. The crystal industry in the East China Sea has a long history. Due to the abundant crystal resources here, the state has entrusted the Donghai County Supply and Marketing Cooperative to purchase crystal for the state since 1953, and then successively established local state-owned Donghai crystal mines, mining companies, 105 mines and other business institutions, specializing in crystal mining, acquisition, management and other work. In 2003, Donghai County was officially named the "Crystal Capital of China".
In order to continue to expand the crystal industry trade in Donghai County, provide entrepreneurial employment opportunities and increase the scope of market business, Donghai County built China Donghai Crystal City in 1992. Since then, the business scope of Donghai Crystal has spread throughout the country and even Japan, South Korea, Southeast Asia, Europe and the United States. After creating a large import and export transaction volume, China Donghai Crystal City has developed into the country's largest crystal professional trading market and distribution center. With the increase in market size and employees, and with the development of the e-commerce industry, China Donghai Crystal City was relocated to the intersection of Jingdu Avenue and Zhonghua Road on the shore of Xishuang Lake in Donghai County in 2016, adjacent to the China Donghai Crystal Museum. Local market practitioners like to refer to the two as "old halls" and "new halls" for short.
1. East China Sea Crystal City
The newly built Donghai Crystal City (see Figure 1) is more diversified than the old hall, not only playing the function of a crystal trading market, but also equipped with an e-commerce area and a comprehensive logistics service area. The most distinctive feature is Hall 3 of Donghai Crystal City, which is a comprehensive supporting area integrating catering, entertainment and shopping.
Fig.1 Crystal City in the East China Sea, China
(1) Hall 1 of Donghai Crystal City
Hall 1 is divided into six sections. There is no specific pattern for each district. Entering the main road on the first floor from the main entrance, you will find some of the boutiques, which are more refined and atmospheric, and the area is larger than the smaller stores in each area. The main business scope of these stores is medium and high-end crystal, silver accessories, fine colored gemstones, high-lead glass handicrafts, etc. There are also small-scale stores in other areas, such as D, E and F, which sell mainly different sizes of crystal balls, crystal glasses, facial gua sha boards and rollers, as well as amethyst geodes and cornucopias from Brazil or Uruguay (see Figure 2), and a few shops sell crystal crushed stones.
Fig.2 Amethyst geode
There are also shops selling non-natural crystal products, such as glass craft shops and synthetic crystal cluster shops. In general, the products sold in these regions are mostly similar. The crystal products here are quoted by the number of pieces or by gram weight, and the large products such as crystal balls and crystal geodes are quoted by the number of kilograms. The second and third floors are dominated by jewelry products, with a large number of crystal bracelet shops, as well as a small number of freshwater pearls, Hetian jade, cinnabar products and packaging gift box stores. What is more distinctive is that there are four or five snack restaurants on the second and third floors of Donghai Crystal City, which greatly meet the dietary needs of some merchants who come from other places to buy goods and anchors who do live broadcasts in the market. The fourth floor is the office service area of Crystal City, as well as several domestic and foreign master studios, crystal craft exhibition area, and e-commerce area.
(2) Hall 2 of Donghai Crystal City
Building 1 is connected to Building 2 and can be reached directly from the 2nd or 3rd floor of Building 1 through a corridor. Compared to Hall 1, Hall 2 will have a higher flow of people and a higher number of shops (see Figure 3). Comparing the layout of the second and third floors of Hall 1, each floor of Hall 2 is divided into five areas, and each area on the third floor is no longer a small shop, but a counter area for centralized sales of goods. Similarly, its first floor is also a number of finely decorated stores, mainly selling products for cross-border e-commerce, such as low-grade bracelets for more than ten yuan each, or carvings and crystal pillars for dozens or even hundreds of yuan.
Fig.3 Interior of Hall 2
The more distinctive part of Hall 2 is the E and T areas on the third floor, which are the areas where colored gems are concentrated. There are not only crystals in Donghai Crystal City, but also other varieties of jewelry and jade products. The coloured gemstones here range from precious varieties such as ruby sapphire and emerald to mid-to-low grade varieties such as crystal or colorless topaz, and in short, the coloured gemstones sold cover almost all the common types in the market. The composition of the museum is also relatively simple, often in the model of "mom-and-pop shop", where women are responsible for selling at the counter, and men go out to overseas gem markets or other domestic gem markets to collect gemstones. The overall quality of the gemstones here is not as high as that of the products sold in the gemstone markets of Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen.
There are also some turquoise shops on the second floor of Hall 2, most of which come from the Shiyan area of Hubei Province, and most of them have been optimized. A small number of shops will write at the door that all the products sold in this store are "second-generation turquoise". The "second-generation turquoise" here refers to the turquoise that has been pressed by powder or pressed from crushed materials, that is, the reconstituted turquoise defined in the relevant national standards. However, some of the so-called "second-generation turquoise" products sold in these stores are not made of turquoise powder or scraps, but are made by adding resin glue and dyes to dyed carbonate or carbonate powder. There are also some shops that mainly sell imitation turquoise products (see Figure 4).
Fig.4 Turquoise imitation
Other more distinctive shops are accessories stores. There are generally two categories of accessories here, one is alloy fittings, and the other is silver-plated gold-plated fittings, and there are fewer 18K gold fittings in the market. The styles of these accessories are very diverse, and the style is mainly based on the "national tide style". Some of the silver fittings are also combined with other jewelry and jade, inlaid with Hetian jade, pearls, lapis lazuli, sunstone, etc.
On the top floor of Hall 2, there are several large domestic logistics express companies, and products that need to be shipped can be brought directly to this floor, and many companies have special personnel to pack goods. This makes the services in Donghai Crystal City more comprehensive. In Donghai Crystal City, you can complete the integrated process of procurement, catering, purchase and packaging, packaging and delivery without leaving the market.
Second, the East China Sea crystal collection
In Donghai County, in addition to the crystal city where you can purchase crystals, the crystal collection is also a very recommended place. The Crystal Bazaar is a traditional local bazaar that is held on a five-day cycle according to specific days of the lunar calendar (see Table 1). At that time, a large number of merchants will take the goods outside for sale. The scale and characteristics of these five large sets are different, according to the scale and the richness of products, the Crystal City New Market Collection, the Running Bull Square Crystal Collection and the Tiancheng Crystal Collection are the most.
Table 1 The time of the East China Sea crystal collection
(1) Crystal City New Market Collection
The Crystal City New Market is the largest of the Crystal Markets, and the area where the Crystal City is held is in the basement parking lot area and the first-floor open-air platform area of Donghai Crystal City (see Figure 5). The products sold in the parking lot on the first basement floor are mainly all kinds of crystal bracelets, moonstone, labradorite, sunstone and other jewelry and jade bracelets (see Figure 6), and the quality is mainly medium and low-grade. It should be noted that in some stalls, there are also merchants who put synthetic crystals on the stalls and do not take the initiative to inform, which is a great test of the eyesight of merchants. In addition to a large number of crystal bracelets, there are also crystal pendants, crystal balls and some crystal carvings. Occasionally, you will see some special varieties such as blue needle crystal, trapiche crystal, blood iolite, etc.
Fig.5 Crystal New Market Collection
Fig.6 Various types of crystal bracelets
On the first floor of the terrace area, merchants will place their goods directly on the ground in bags, mainly some unprocessed crystal raw materials and other jade varieties, such as crystal rough and scraps, agate flakes, low-quality crystal balls and crystal Wenchang pagoda. This area is mainly wholesale, the quality of goods is generally low, some crystal industry practitioners often love to inspect this layer, in order to select the right quality of crystal rough for creation and processing, made into crystal ornaments or grinding beads.
(2) Tiancheng crystal collection
Tiancheng Crystal Collection is close to the old Crystal City and Tiancheng Crystal Plaza, and the products sold in this place are mainly rough crystals and semi-finished rough stones (see Figure 7), as well as simple carved crystal handles. For rough crystals, some sightkeepers will bring flashlights to facilitate the observation of the fractured inclusions inside the crystal. Some merchants also sell the corners of the crystal, which are often leftovers from large-diameter crystal balls and crystal bracelets. These pieces may not look inconspicuous at the skim, but there are many crystal connoisseurs who pick out the high-end ones and process them into crystal pendants or facets. There are also some merchants who put out unpolished crystal ornaments, which have a certain gambling nature, and the surface is often coated with oil or sprinkled with water to facilitate the buyer's observation of the inside of the crystal. In addition, there are some non-jewelry products made of fluorite, malachite, lapis lazuli, labradorite and other gems and jades for sale.
Fig.7 Rough crystal
III. Conclusion
The Donghai Crystal Market is a relatively mature crystal distribution center, with a rich variety of crystals sold locally and other common jewelry and jade varieties. The whole market is mainly wholesale, and the product styles produced are relatively simple, mainly for crystal balls, ornaments, bracelets and other types. In addition, there are still situations in the market where merchants do not clearly inform synthetic products and processed products, and it is necessary to strengthen the standardized supervision of the market.
References
[1] Zhang Shouzhong, Hu Limin.The crystal capital of the world——East China Sea[J].Jiangsu Local Chronicles,2019(6):87-92.
[2] Zhang Tianyu. Research on landscape space design of characteristic towns from the perspective of industry-city integration[D].Wuxi:Jiangnan University, 2021.
[3] Deng Qian, Ke Jie.Turquoise Identification Fake[M].Shanghai:Cultural Development Press,2016.
Written / Photo courtesy: Zhang Lian