The Collection of Mimi Wong stands as one of the most comprehensive and celebrated collections of Chinese classical furniture in Asia. Carefully built up over nearly four decades, this remarkable collection features significant and exemplary pieces, reflecting Mimi Wong’s discerning eye and passion for classical Chinese art. Through this auction, Mimi Wong shares her vision and invites a new generation of collectors to explore and cherish the artistry and timeless appeal of Chinese classical furniture. Highlights from the Collection include a 17th-century, magnificent huanghuali single plank-top pedestal table, jiaji’an, a rare surviving example; and a 16th-17th century, rare pair of huanghuali and burlwood ‘fu’ character yokeback armchairs, sichutouguanmaoyi.

Lot 959. A magnificent huanghuali single plank-top pedestal table, jiaji’an, 17th century. Overall: 82.5 cm high, 306 cm wide, 52 cm deep. Plank-top: 7 cm thick. Price realised HK$33,045,000 (Estimate: HK$7,000,000 - 10,000,000). © Christie's Images Ltd 2025.

Literature: R. Hatfield Ellsworth, N. Grindley and Anita Christy, Chinese Furniture - One Hundred Examples from the Mimi and Raymond Hung Collection, New York, 1996, pp. 180-181, no.69

Note: Surviving examples of single plank-top pedestal tables, in general, appear to be quite rare, and compared to other types of tables, relatively few extant examples are known. This is perhaps due to the fact that the individual elements are easily demountable, and often do not survive together. However, it is this fact that makes the form so versatile, as it is easily moved and configured to fit a variety of spaces. The massive size of the current plank suggests that the table would have been immensely costly, even at the time of manufacture, and a highly prized possession of the wealthy scholar or official who owned it.

Compare with a painting table of similar form illustrated by Wang Shixiang in Mingshi jiajv yanjiu, Beijing, 2018, pl.no. yi-124. It is mentioned in the book that when Lubanguan acquired the table, the staff reduced the length of the tabletop by 2 feet because they believed that such massive size would be difficult to sell.

Lot 960. An extremely rare huanghuali continuous horseshoe-back reclining armchair, 17th century. Overall: 122 cm high, 70 cm wide, 121.3 cm deep overall. Price realised HK$14,895,000 (Estimate: HK$1,200,000 - 2,000,000). © Christie's Images Ltd 2025.

Literature: R. Hatfield Ellsworth, N. Grindley and Anita Christy, Chinese Furniture - One Hundred Examples from the Mimi and Raymond Hung Collection, New York, 1996, pp. 90-91, no.25

Note: This horseshoe back 'reclining' armchair with a folding leg-rest not only has survived in exceptional condition, it also appears to be a unique design. No other horseshoe chairs of this form are known.

Designed for the occupant to recline and rest with their legs supported on the extension to the seat, this extension can then be neatly folded away to reveal an inbuilt footrest, which, in turn, can be retracted beneath the seat.

This chair has a host of unusual features that include the splat curving beyond the curved rail into a strong scroll, a feature found on Qing lacquer armchairs but rarely on hardwood examples. On the inner curve of this scroll are two beautifully carved dragons, curled back on themselves in a manner reminiscent of the scrolled tendrils on the arms of the famous pair of zitan armchairs with foot stretchers in the Palace Museum, Beijing, see The Complete Collection of Ming and Qing Furniture in the Palace Museum, vol. 4, Beijing, 2015, no.8. The caning to the splat is another unusual feature, sometimes found on yoke back armchairs but rarely, if ever, on a horseshoe back chair. This canework panel to the splat, the seat and extension to the seat appear to be original as does the split-bamboo supporting structure and the trimming strips.

It is thought that many chairs, if we are to believe the evidence of woodblock illustrations, were provided with separate footrests, as were canopy beds, but the paucity of surviving examples and the consequential wear on the footrails of both horseshoe back and yoke back armchairs indicate that were frequently separated. A late example of a hongmu horseshoe armchair with simple folding footrest which simply hinges forward from its locating slots in the side stretchers is preserved in the Palace Museum collection, see The Complete Collection of Ming and Qing Furniture in the Palace Museum, vol. 4, Beijing, 2015, no. 21. The example being offered here is a much more sophisticated piece. The footrest which retracts fully beneath the seat of the chair has slightly splayed round section legs which mimic the design of the chair legs. The lattice design, reminiscent of low garden balustrades and tied bamboo edging, between the legs gives added strength and rigidity to the footrest enabling it to bear the weight of the folding seat extension. This seat extension is securely fixed to the extended footrest by means of a tenon at the end of each leg, which, in turn, slots into a short post projecting up from the footstool and cut with a receiving open sided mortice.

The ingenuity and complexity of this chair and its integral seat extension and foot stool is a testament to the sophistication of late Ming, early Qing chair manufacture for this is surely a one off specific order for a sophisticated client.

Lot 963. A rare pair of huanghuali and burlwood ‘fu’ character yokeback armchairs, sichutouguanmaoyi, 16th-17th century. Overall: 117.5 cm high, 64 cm wide, 48.5 cm deep. Price realised HKD$5,166,000 (Estimate: HK$4,800,000 - 7,000,000). © Christie's Images Ltd 2025.

Provenance: Acquired in Connecticut in the 1970s
Sold at Sotheby’s New York, The Reverend Richard Fabian Collection of Chinese Classical Furniture, 15 March 2016, lot 32

Note: The current pair of chairs belongs to a small group, featuring flanged tripartite backsplat with a central well-figured burlwood panel set between an openwork fu-character and a U-shaped panel, the turned vase-and-bamboo arm post, and inward set barbed and beaded apron.

According to Curtis Evarts in his article, ‘From Ornate to Unadorned: A Study of Yoke-back Chairs’. The Journal of the Classical Chinese Furniture Society, Spring 1993, pp.24-33, there are nine other armchairs of this form known, despite slight variations in size and decoration. There are only two other pairs recorded: one, same as the current lot, formerly from the Reverend Richard Fabian, sold at China Guardian Beijing, 17 November 2019, lot 4636; the other formerly in the collection of John Alex McCone, sold at Sotheby’s New York, 3 June 1992, lot 348, but with huanghuali panels in the center of backsplat instead of burlwood. Evarts linked these eleven superbly crafted chairs to a larger group of twenty-four, bearing all or some of the decorative elements, indicating that they were individually commissioned from a single workshop.

This pair of highly ornate yokeback armchairs is rich with symbolic meaning. The prominent fu character conveys a wish for happiness, while the vase and bamboo (zhubao pingan) posts, serves as a rebus for ‘ (bamboo) virtue brings peace’, and the dynamic carved spandrels flanking the backsplat culminating in flowerheads under the toprail set the chair firmly as a great gift to commemorate an important life achievement.

Lot 961. A huanghuali painting table, hua’an, 17th-18th century. Overall: 87.6 cm high, 205.1 cm wide, 67.9 cm deep. Price realised HK$4,536,000 (Estimate: HK$1,800,000 - 3,000,000). © Christie's Images Ltd 2025.

Literature: R. Hatfield Ellsworth, N. Grindley and Anita Christy, Chinese Furniture - One Hundred Examples from the Mimi and Raymond Hung Collection, New York, 1996, pp. 170-171, no.64

Exhibited: Essence of Style: Chinese Furniture of the Late Ming and Early Qing Dynasties, Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, 17 January- 6 September 1998, pp.78-79, no.24

Note: This rectangular inset leg bridle joint table is unorthodox in several respects. It is very close to the true proportions of a painting table as opined by Wen Zhenheng in volume 6 of the Zhang Wu Zhi and differs only in that he suggests that a painting table should have everted flanges, albeit flat and rounded.The author also mentioned that a table with a stretcher between the feet, as here, was even better (Craig Clunas’ translation, Superfluous Things, Material Culture and Social Status in Early Modern China, page 42). The long side aprons and the end aprons are highlighted by the simple expedience of a raised bead to the lower edge which follows the shape of the unmitred bridle joint and terminates in a simple angular scroll repeated at the corners of the end aprons as well. Without doubt though, the most unusual feature of this table is the upward curved stretcher between the legs, a curve reflected in the gently outward splayed feet. This feature is unknown on any other tables published so far of this type. This shape is reflected, not only, in the upper stretcher between the legs but also in the mitred aprons that form part of the inner framing decoration of these legs. One imagines that this would be profligate use of a precious, and expensive, timber but the expedience of cutting each stretcher from a single piece of wood, one above the other, would result in the loss of only the lowest crescent shape and the upper two corners. The same technique would be used for creating the matching upper and lower aprons, and the apron beneath the stretchers.

A considerably smaller, and aesthetically less successful table in the collection of the Palace Museum, Beijing, published by Wang Shixiang in Classic Chinese Furniture – Ming and Early Qing Dynasties, 1986. no. 113 exhibits the same unmitred bridle joint and angular relief carving to the aprons, but not the splayed foot or the curved stretchers, is also ascribed a Ming date by Wang Shixiang.

Lot 966. A rare huanghuali temple form shrine, hua’an, 17th century. Overall: 71.1 cm high, 96.5 cm wide, 45.7 cm deep. Price realised HK$2,898,000 (Estimate: HK$1,000,000 - 1,500,000). © Christie's Images Ltd 2025.

Literature: R. Hatfield Ellsworth, N. Grindley and Anita Christy, Chinese Furniture - One Hundred Examples from the Mimi and Raymond Hung Collection, New York, 1996, pp. 238-239, no.98

Exhibited: Essence of Style: Chinese Furniture of the Late Ming and Early Qing Dynasties, Asian Art Museum of San Francisco, 17 January- 6 September 1998, pp.78-79, no.24

Note: Most Chinese homes contained shrines to household deities who had specific domestic or heavenly terrain. Daily or seasonal veneration of these spirits, as well as Buddhist, Daoist, and ancestral worthies, assured temporal worlds would be maintained. The current huanghuali temple-form shrine is of substantial size would have been made for an affluent household.

Compare with a pair of huanghuali temple-form shrines sold at Christie’s Hong Kong, 3 December 2008, lot 2534.

Christie's. Important Chinese Ceramics and Works of Art, Hong Kong, 2 May 2025