Celebrating AAPIHM: SoCal's longest running antique store celebrates Chinese art; oldest shop in US

PASADENA, Calif. (KABC) -- A family-owned store on Pasadena's Colorado Boulevard has the distinction of being the oldest continually operating Asian antique shops in the United States.

"F Suie One Co." has been in business since 1888, and it's located at 1335 E. Colorado Boulevard.

"My grandmother had a great idea of selling antiques," said co-owner Leslee See Leong. "She had a friend who was a soldier of fortune in China at that time. And so the soldier of fortune gathered those things for my grandmother, sent them in to Los Angeles."

"We were the mainstay of the Asian Antique business, from the 1930s up until today. Now we look back at it, 'Oh my goodness, he went back and took all the treasures from China!' But if he hadn't gone back and gotten those treasures from China, they would have been destroyed in the Cultural Revolution," Leong said. "He saved so much of the culture of China, and the artworks of China."

"I definitely feel the responsibility because of all of the people that have come before. It's just a great history," said co-owner Joe Schulman. "I'm learning something every day."

"So our business is very well documented, and so I think we're used as an example in many ways, to the future generations," Leong said. "We take that pretty seriously."