Hubay got up early, and after delivering a greeting card to the governor's office, he and his waiters came to the market in Jiuquan excitedly.
What surprised Hubayi was that the markets in most cities were quite dirty and messy, but now the market in Jiuquan was actually orderly and the ground was extremely clean.
This kind of market makes people feel happy physically and mentally. Not only Hubayi thinks so, but his waiter also said:
"Shopkeeper, this Jiuquan City is different from before. This Governor Zeng is really capable!"
"Stop yelling, Zeng Sima is just the Sima of the Bafu, not the Grand Administrator of Suzhou."
Hubayi took the guys around the market for a while, but shook his head a little. There were really too few products in Jiuquan City!
Having experienced the prosperity of Gaochang City and Shazhou City, it was difficult for Hu Bayi to take a fancy to the goods on the market in Jiuquan City.
There are also cheap ironware available for purchase in Guazhou City. Hubayi walked around the market in Jiuquan City, but he didn't see anything that caught his eye.
Hu Bayi still shook his head. Sandwiched between Zhangye City and Guazhou City, Jiuquan City was really featureless.
If only the service of the inn was better, it wouldn't be enough to retain businessmen like them.
After all, for businessmen, time is money, and the profit of a business trip is quite large. A city without value has no value of stopping.
At this time, Hubay saw a lot of people crowded in front of them, and he walked over with his assistant curiously.
Taking a closer look, it turned out to be a cloth shop. Hubay was a little confused, why were there so many people in front of the cloth shop?
Cotton has been cultivated in Longyou for a long time, and many countries in the Western Region produce cotton products.
However, compared to the smoothness of silk, the cloth woven from cotton is too rough and the color is not gorgeous enough.
When King Jianning was in Guazhou, some players improved the cotton weaving technology and invented the cotton weaving machine.
They also vigorously introduced better cotton varieties from the Western Regions and even Dashi, and now Shazhou's cotton cloth also has a certain reputation.
However, merchants from the Western Regions prefer cold-resistant plush fabrics and gorgeous silks, and no merchant from the Western Regions would purchase cotton in large quantities.
The cotton produced in Shazhou, Guazhou is popular among the people. This kind of textile is more comfortable to wear than linen, and it is much more comfortable to wear next to the body than linen.
All in all, cotton cloth is a commodity that merchants look down upon and the people like it very much. The price cannot be sold, and it is not a valuable commodity for long-distance transportation.
But why are so many merchants gathered in this cotton shop?
Hubay squeezed in curiously and saw that the cloth sold in this shop was different from that sold in other cloth shops.
The cloth sold in this shop is actually colorful!
The shop owner was demonstrating to the merchant how washable the color of this cloth was.
The boss put the purple cloth into the basin and rubbed it vigorously. Although some purple appeared in the basin, the unfolded cloth still maintained its bright color.
Hubayi's eyes lit up, he actually had such a powerful ability to dye cloth?
You must know that silk in this era is more of a consumable product.
Because of the dyeing technology of this era, silk will seriously fade as soon as it is washed. For example, the clothes worn by emperors are rarely washed. The clothes worn by Emperor Ming of the Sui Dynasty and washed three times will be recorded in history books as
Frugality, that’s why.
The color of silk clothes that have been washed three times will be washed away. This is indeed quite frugal for the supreme emperor.
The clothes worn by dignitaries are usually simply dusted off. If they are really dirty and need to be washed, they are washed once or twice at most and then thrown away.
Not just silk, but most textiles of this era were like this.
The dyes of this era were all extracted from animals, plants and minerals, and the colors they dyed were not bright enough.
But the purple of the cotton cloth in front of me is quite bright, and it won’t fade even after being washed!
This kind of purple is a purple that Hubay has never added before. If this kind of fabric is made into clothes, it will definitely be loved by the kings of the Western Regions and the food governors!
When he thought of this, Hubay was about to rush to buy cloth. At this time, the shopkeeper took out another piece of blue cloth.
Is there such a bright blue color in this world?!
This blue is brighter than the purple just now, shining with a charming luster.
I only heard the shopkeeper say: "Gentlemen, this piece of cloth is the treasure of our store! This blue color was personally given the name by Zeng Taishou - Jiuquan Blue! This is the only color of our Jiuquan, you can only buy it in Jiuquan
How can I buy such beautiful cloth!”
Hubay looked at this dark blue fabric and thought of the salt lake he had seen before.
The salt lake that reflects the blue sky is this blue under the sun. It is so beautiful!
This kind of fabric will definitely fetch a high price!
There are two main things I look for in clothes these days, material and color.
Silk is of course the best material. This comfortable and breathable material is suitable for close-fitting wear in spring, summer, autumn and winter.
But cotton is also very comfortable, and most importantly, the bright color is really eye-catching!
Whether it's the food that advocates glitz or Byzantium, which is more decadent and decadent, this bright color will definitely make those nobles crazy!
Dozens of rolls of Prussian blue and Jiuquan blue fabrics in the shop were swept away by merchants. The merchants who had not bought any fabrics heard that they would still have them in stock tomorrow, and decided to go to the market again tomorrow.
At the same time, the shop owner also told the merchants that as long as Jiuquan is a cloth guild shop, this kind of Jiuquan blue cotton will be put on the shelves in the near future. More and brighter colors will be developed one after another. Interested merchants can go to other stores to see
look.
At this moment, Zeng Mu and Zhao Chen visited this newly opened workshop together.
Originally Zeng Mu wanted to invite Zhao Chen and Wang Xue to open a pharmaceutical factory manufacturing salicylic acid in Jiuquan.
Unfortunately, there are no willow forests near Jiuquan. Although aspirin in later generations could be industrially synthesized, in this era it could only be extracted from plants.
Zeng Mu gave up the idea of building a pharmaceutical factory, but he invited Zhao Chen to come to Jiuquan to inspect the project to see if any workshops could be built.
When Zeng Mu was in Liulin, he gave Zhao Chen Wang Xue's first round of investment.
Later, when the pharmaceutical factory wanted to expand, it also relied on the NPCs trained by Zeng Mu.
Now that Zeng Mu had spoken, Zhao Chen followed him to Jiuquan to investigate what industries could be developed here.
After Zhao Chen arrived in Jiuquan, he also inspected a lot. It wasn't until he saw the cotton cloth in Jiuquan that he came up with an idea.
Jiuquan has a history of producing cotton cloth for a hundred years, but all the cloth produced here is ordinary white cloth, and only ordinary people can wear it.
Cotton cloth is naturally not a high-end product, but in later generations cotton cloth became the first textile material, and a part of the credit comes from dyes!
Dyes give white cotton more colors!
Zhao Chen studied pharmacy, and a large category of chemical agents is dyes, which he also studied as an undergraduate.
If there is one of the most famous colors in the world, a color that has been deeply embedded in human genes along with the memory of the industrial era, it is Prussian blue!
This dye was invented by German workers. This blue color is very bright and not easily washed away by water. It became very popular as soon as it was launched.
Later, the Second German Empire purchased Prussian blue fabric as military uniforms, which further infiltrated this color into history and became a memory of the industrial era.
And it just so happens that Jiuquan has all the raw materials needed for Prussian blue dye!
The chemical formula of Prussian blue is iron ferrocyanide. In the post-industrial era, it was naturally chemically synthesized. However, when Prussian blue was first born, it was mixed and roasted with plant ash and cow blood, washed, filtered and evaporated, and then a ferric chloride solution was added.
obtained later.
The most unique thing is that these raw materials are available in Jiuquan!
Not to mention plant ash, you can get it by calcining grass.
Jiuquan is close to Zhangye and has a relatively developed animal husbandry industry. There are many cattle and sheep here, and cattle blood is easy to obtain.
Finally, there is the ferric chloride solution. Jiuquan is close to Guazhou. Ferric chloride is just an industrial waste that no one wants at the Dashuixia Iron Works. Zeng Mu easily obtained a lot of it from the Dashuixia Iron Works.
With these raw materials, after a period of experimental mixing, Zhao Chen finally prepared Prussian blue!
Zeng Mu was overjoyed. Dyestuffs are a major category in the chemical industry. This is also an industry closely related to the textile industry, and it is a very profitable industry!
After acquiring Prussian blue, Zeng Mu did not sell the dye at a high price. Instead, he asked Zhao Chenji to build a dye workshop, and then summoned people from the cloth guild to sell the dye to them.
Zeng Mu also specially named this dye Jiuquan Blue, intending to use this dye to enhance the popularity of Jiuquan.
Zeng Mu announced at the Cloth Guild meeting that all shops that joined the Cloth Guild could purchase Jiuquan blue dye under license.
All of a sudden, all the cloth merchants had joined the cloth guild, and Prussian blue cotton became an explosion as expected!
This kind of cotton cloth, which is bright and does not fade easily, soon became Jiuquan's signature specialty. Businessmen from Guazhou and Zhangye would come to Jiuquan specifically to buy Jiuquan blue dyed cloth.
After Zeng Mu finished visiting the workshop, he asked Zhao Chen beside him: "Mr. Zhao, how long can our technical advantage be maintained?"
Zhao Chen calculated and said: "Laboratory preparation is not difficult. The preparation method of Prussian blue is written in textbooks. It only takes a few weeks to determine the proportion of raw materials and then it can be copied."
Zeng Mu frowned: "If Prussian blue is so easy to produce, then Jiuquan's monopoly cannot be maintained for too long?"
Nowadays, players are also very involved. Players in the area are showing off their magical powers in Eight Immortals Crossing the Sea and developing their own territories.
Zhao Chen smiled again and said: "The laboratory preparation output is too low. To reach the output of our workshop, we must complete industrial transformation and require a large number of skilled workers. Today's technical advantages are not
It’s so easy to catch up.”
Zeng Mu breathed a sigh of relief. Looking at the busy workers in the dye workshop, he felt a sense of great achievements.