Zhang Jingjiang, founder of the former Ton Ying Company. [Photo by Judy Zhu/China Daily]

In September 2014 a monumental imperial Qing Dynasty vase was sold at auction for $24.7 million at the Boston-based auction house Skinner, topping all sales of Qing Dynasty vases in the US to that point. The anonymous buyer was believed to be from the Chinese mainland.

"There were mainly three factors that contributed to the phenomenal sale," Chen says. "First is its size, measuring 34.5 inches (87.6 cm). Second is its overall decoration that employed a wide range of techniques, which in turn gives it the nickname Ci Mu Ping, or 'Mother of all ceramics'.

"Last but not least is that this vase is almost identical to one housed by Beijing's Palace Museum, and is one of only two of its kind."

In an interview with Antiques and the Arts Weekly, Judith Dowling, the Harvard-trained expert who presided over the record-breaking sale, said the vase "was last seen publicly in 1964 at Parke-Bernet Galleries in New York, where it was in a sale of Asian things belonging to Ton Ying & Company".

"They encountered me at preview and asked to photocopy that auction catalog of 1964, which includes a detailed description and a full-page black-and-white picture of the vase."

On the fringe of the yellow page, beside the description, a number had been written down: 750.

"That amount is a clear indicator that people understood its value even back then. But no one had quite anticipated the rise," Chen says.

"Since the mid-1990s the market for Chinese antiques has shifted gradually from the US and Europe to China, as the Chinese are rediscovering their own cultural heritage."