China Umbrella Museum

This guide to the China Umbrella Museum in Hangzhou opens on a single object: a bright red, oiled-paper wedding umbrella that a matchmaker once held above a bride's head for her last steps as an unmarried woman, before stopping at the threshold rather than crossing it. It unpacks the old warning behind that pause, built on a pun between the words for umbrella and to scatter that sound nearly identical in Chinese. From there it moves deeper into the galleries, where the same superstition turns up in an entirely different form. Next time rain catches you outside, think about which side of the door you're standing on.