Ruixing Lu, a successful businessman, founded the Wuxi Chinese Blue Calico Museum. It was the first privately owned museum in Wuxi. He spent more that ten years to set it up. He collected thousands of valuable blue calico handcrafts from the Qing Dynasty to the 1960’s in the twentieth century. They are precious resources for research of Chinese traditional cultures. The most valuable material is Jia Xie, the woodcarving board and Jia Xie handiworks. They are the ancestors of Chinese Blue Calico.

Ruxing has contributed many straw sandals from China and straw boots from Japan to the collection.

He also visited the collection in Storrs, CT and discussed sandal origins and construction methods with curator Larry Hightower.