A few weeks ago, we were in San Francisco and stopped at one of our favorite shops, Brendan Lai Supply Co. Brendan, sadly, has been gone for several years, but the shop continues to operate under the experienced and expert guidance of his wife, Esther, and son, Al. A single post does not offer the […]
28
2013
20
2013
Tai Chi For Health: Core Movements Workshop (2 Opportunities!)
Always pleased to let those of you in our area (Santa Cruz, CA) know about the local seminars we host at our Academy. Although this ‘Tai Chi box’ is something Ted teaches to his beginning Tai Chi students, it is coming from the martial perspective, and maintains the structure of Tai Chi Chuan, so it […]
16
2013
A Couple of Old Friends (that is, Books) Return
Is it silly to get worked up over the return of books? If so, then color me silly, because I actually get excited when certain titles come back to Plum, in this case, two that have been difficult to restock for awhile: Chi Family TongBei and Chuo Jiao. In both cases, we were only able […]
21
2013
12
2013
Bagua Zhang’s 8 Animals: First the seminar, now the Book (and DVD!)
It’s not our way to just ‘bang something out,’ so the basic manual turned into a larger project, and soon we had a fully illustrated and photographed, 144 page book, not just on the Eight Animals…
13
2013
20
2012
19
2012
A Rare Baji Announcement
At Plum, we love Baji Quan. But there is not that much available and, even some of what is produced is out of print. So, it is with a bit of excitement that we announce the return (in limited supply) of Su Yu Chang’s Liu Da Kai Baji DVD. We don’t have a tall stack […]
15
2012
Chen ZhengLei’s Taijiquan Manuals–In English!
Grandmaster Chen ZhengLei, of course, is one of the tigers of Chen Style Taijiquan…
9
2012
Sometimes They Come Back
A few more desirable Chinese-language books have found their way back to us, and we offer them for your enjoyment. As with many of these, they are limited in supply…click any picture to go to the page to read more about these books, or to order.
2
2012
Sun LuTang’s Xing Yi Quan Xue: Alive and Well
I don’t think that we will ever get tired of announcing the returns of important works to martial artists, like today’s Xing Yi Xuan Xue: The Study of Form-Mind Boxing, which is now in stock at Plum. When we first started Plum, a lot of our quest to ‘bring to light’ these works involved rummaging through […]
27
2012
More of the Good Stuff
Just received a nice order with some items that had been gone for a while…thought you’d like to know! Here are the first few…more, soon!
18
2012
Sun LuTang Returns to Plum
Plum’s first mission statement included the words, “…to preserve and promote Traditional Chinese Martial Arts.” That was almost 20 years ago…
6
2012
Gao style Bagua Bear Boxing DVD
To the best of our knowledge, Plum’s newest offering, Marcus Brinkman’s DVD on Bagua Bear Boxing, has never previously been available…
29
2012
The DVD That Completes the Book
As we promised, though a little late, we have finally completed our DVD on the Bandit Knife form. This is the much-requested companion to our book, “The Bandit Knife: Kung Fu’s Rebellious Weapon.” This new DVD fills in where the book left off, covering demonstrations of basic strikes, and a step-by-step breakdown of the complete […]
25
2012
Sunday Qigong Seminar Series: The Five Animal Frolics
Completing this summer’s Qigong seminar series at our own Academy in Santa Cruz, California, is the Five Animal Frolics. Said to be created by the legendary doctor Hua Tuo over 1500 years ago, this Qigong combines spirit and action to imitate Tiger, Deer, Monkey, Bear and Bird, and their corresponding representative states of consciousness. This particular […]
13
2012
Ooops!
Oy vay…one of our faithful customers just reported that the ‘Chinese Books links’ on our books page had disappeared. Don’t worry! What we lack in web vigilance we more than make up for in great, rare, interesting, astonishing and downright wonderful books in Traditional and Simplified Chinese on the martial arts. So, just to say…they’re […]
12
2012
Wang ShuJin’s Bagua Zhang DVD
Kent Howard’s companion disk to his translation of Wang ShuJin’s Bagua Linked Palms.
8
2012
Sunday Seminar Series: Taoist Wudang Qigong
On July 15, Plum will be co-hosting—along with our school, The Academy of Martial and Internal Arts—the second in our summer Qigong series. Taoists monks at the famous Wudang Temple developed this simple, modular routine centuries ago, and it is one of the treasures of Qigong. This particular regimen is a series of 14 linked […]
11
2012
Magic and Martial Arts
Ted and I ran into a friend the other day, a consummate and quite excellent magician…