One Pillar Pagoda Bat Trang Ceramic Dish

A small rectangular ceramic dish from Bat Trang, Vietnam, with "Bat Trang Vietnam" stamped on the base. Inside, there's a colourful drawing of Hanoi's One Pillar Pagoda: a red roof over a blue shrine on its single column, set in a square lotus pond with palms and a willow behind it. A thin navy line runs around the rim, and the caption reads "Chùa Một Cột - Hà Nội". It fits neatly in your palm, perfect as a trinket tray, a soap dish or a little souvenir of Hanoi.

The pagoda was built in 1049 by King Lý Thái Tông. As the story goes, the childless king dreamt that Avalokiteshvara, the Goddess of Mercy, handed him a baby boy while seated on a lotus. He built the shrine on a single pillar so it would look like a lotus flower rising out of the water. Bat Trang, where this dish was made, has been a pottery village for more than 700 years.