[Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

British trader William G. Gulland (1841-1906) donated dozens of single-colored glaze ceramics to the V&A, hoping that scholars and ceramic technicians could figure out the formula. Among them was this red-glaze "high foot" cup. Gulland’s work at an import and export company enabled him to travel often to Hong Kong, Guangzhou, Xiamen in Fujian province and Ningbo in Zhejiang province, all major Chinese ports at the time. He became interested in collecting Chinese ceramics. He wrote a two-volume book about Chinese ceramics, which was published in 1898 and 1902.