Fu Lin Tang, Historical heritage site in Kunming, China
Fu Lin Tang is a three-storey Chinese timber-and-earth pharmacy at 31 Guanghua Street, on the corner of Guanghua and Wenming streets in Kunming's Wuhua District. Its 200 m² footprint carries 500 m² of floor space. The corner entrance sits between two bays facing north and two facing west, under a fan-shaped single-eave overhanging roof of grey tiles; carved architraves and lantern-hung hanging columns decorate the eaves.
Founded in 1857, the seventh year of the Xianfeng reign, by Li Yuqing, whose ancestral home was Huanggang in Hubei, Fu Lin Tang began as a single shopfront so cramped that locals called it the "Winnowing Basket Hall". Over several generations it grew into one of Kunming's best-known Chinese medicine shops. In 1956 it joined the public-private partnership that formed the Kunming Medicinal Materials Processing Factory, and in 2000 it was reorganised as Kunming Fu Lin Tang Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. It was listed as a Kunming municipal protected site in 2003, a Yunnan provincial one in 2012 and a Major Historical and Cultural Site Protected at the National Level in 2013.
The name Fu Lin Tang comes from the phrase "fu ze xing lin", meaning blessing on the apricot grove, the grove being a classical image for the medical profession. Founded in 1857 by Li Yuqing, whose ancestral home was Huanggang, Hubei, the shop was long known locally as Boji Tang, the winnowing-basket hall, for its single narrow shopfront. It became one of Kunming's best-known Chinese medicine shops and was named a China Time-honoured Brand in 2006.
Fu Lin Tang stands at 31 Guanghua Street, at the corner of Guanghua and Wenming streets in Wuhua District, and is still a working pharmacy, so visits fit around counter service. The corner entrance opens under carved beams with lantern-hanging posts; the two facades face north and west. The upper floors are not open to the public, so the carved eaves and fan-shaped tile roof are best seen from street level.
The building stands where Guanghua and Wenming streets meet, so its corner entrance and eight-sided plan let it face both roads. Locals once called the cramped original shopfront "Bojitang", the winnowing-basket hall, because a single bay was all the space it had.
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