ABOUT dIASPORA IN A TEACUP
The contemporary archaeology project shared here examines the business of Fawn Sam Louie and Wai Sue Chun Louie. A married couple, the Louies ran a restaurant supply business in Berkeley, California, from about 1953 until shortly after Fawn’s death in 1996. Traces of their business can be found in thrift stores, ebay, etsy, flea markets, antique stalls and kitchen cabinets across the US, in the form of the beautiful, bespoke, porcelain tableware they sold.
The Project, housed out of the American Material Culture Lab of the Department of Anthropology at University of California Berkeley, is a collaboration between Dr. Laurie A. Wilkie (Berkeley Anthropology) and Dr. Kelly Fong, Asian American Studies Department, UCLA. To date, over three hundred pieces of FS Louie ceramics, representing at least 200 distinct restaurants, are housed at Berkeley.
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