How a humble cabbage became one of the Forbidden City’s most memorable treasures

EDITOR’S NOTE: Curio is a CNN Style series spotlighting small objects and the big ideas behind them.

The Louvre’s “Mona Lisa,” the British Museum’s Rosetta Stone, MoMA’s “Starry Night” — major museums often have one must-see item that singlehandedly draws visitors from around the world.

For the National Palace Museum, in Taiwan’s capital Taipei, the star attraction is somewhat humbler: a cabbage.

Carved from a block of white and green jadeite, the remarkably realistic sculpture of a Chinese cabbage glistens as if freshly picked from a field, still wet with morning dew. A katydid and locust lurk in its verdant leaves, while the unknown sculptor used the material’s natural flaws to create the illusion of ribs running along its stems.

Resting gently on a wooden stand, the carving is just 7.4 inches tall. But it is so popular that it occupies its own exhibition hall. The museum even publicizes which dates the object will be away on “business trips” — in other words, when it is on loan or exhibited elsewhere — so visitors are not left disappointed.