Exterior of Guanfu Museum in the Shanghai Tower, Lujiazui, Shanghai. (Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn)

The Lujiazui financial hub in the city of Shanghai contains some iconic skyscrapers that house many financial institutions. But the skyscrapers also contain private museums such as the Guanfu Museum in the Shanghai Tower, Yunjian Art Museum in the World Financial Center, and the Aurora Museum in the Aurora Tower, which combine culture and finance, the news portal newsvalley.cn reported on March 30.

Guanfu Museum

This is on the 37th floor of the Shanghai Tower and consists of five halls with more than 500 artifacts made of gold, as well as antique furniture, Buddhist statues, textiles, and an impressive ceramic collection from the Song Dynasty (960-1279).

Next to the museum is the Baoku Art Center, which contains a reproduction of a traditional Chinese garden and an "Olive Circle", designed by Dutch architect Alfonso Wolbert. It also has a 480-square-meter ballroom with an enamel floor, which is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the world's largest enamel hall. It took 134 craftsmen 321,681 hours to complete.

The museum and center are part of the Guanfu Baoku project, whose purpose is to make Chinese culture available to the public.

Yunjian Art Museum

This is on the 29th floor of the World Financial Center and covers an 800-sq-m area and is a base for academic research and cultural exchanges.

It is divided into two sections, one that provides a venue for cultural and art events, and the other housing a ceramic collection from the Guan Kiln, an imperial site during the Tang (AD 618-907), Song (960-1279), Yuan (1271-1368), Ming (1368-1644) and Qing (1644-1911) dynasties, that is not open to the public.

Because of its artistic value, the museum has gotten support from the US, German, British, French and other consulates in Shanghai, to increase cooperation and exchanges with Western cultural and art centers.

Aurora Museum

This is on the 2nd floor of the Aurora Tower and was established by Chen Yung-Tai, chairman of Taiwan, China's Aurora Group, an office equipment and furniture supplier. It is meant to promote traditional Chinese culture and modern art to educate the public.

It takes up six stories and has a floor area of 6,300 sq m, with a wide array of exhibits, including Buddhist statues, jade artifacts, porcelain object, and records such as photos of archaeological sites, from Cheni's personal collection. It also has a smart tour guide system that uses modern technology to make the visit a better experience. The system connects to iPhones to provide routes based on the visitor's amount of time, with various language services.

The museum also supports academic research and has worked with top universities, such as Beijing's Peking University, Shanghai's Fudan University, and Switzerland's University of Berne, and has archaeology and history professors on its academic panel and can show the latest research results in exhibits or books.

(Source: chinadaily.com.cn)