In the Tang dynasty, people attached the most importance to the front door and the main hall of a house, because the front door was for everyone to see, and the main hall was for entertaining distinguished guests. Both of them were for outsiders, and they protected the face of a family, so they had to be attached importance to. However, they did not attach much importance to places like the kitchen and the washroom. If one were to ask where the dirtiest place in a family was, the answer would be the washroom, followed by the kitchen. This was the case no matter if it was the home of a noble or an ordinary poor person.
In fact, it was precisely the kitchen and the washroom that seemed to be not very important that could improve the quality of a family's life. If a person wanted to live, he or she had to eat, drink, and defecate. Eating and drinking could not leave the kitchen, and defecating could not leave the washroom. Only by serving his or her own food, drink, and defecate comfortably could he or she live a comfortable and healthy life. If the kitchen that provided food and drink was not clean enough, people would easily eat dirty things, which would cause various diseases, especially gastrointestinal diseases. If the washroom was not good enough, it would also cause various problems. For example, if the washroom was too smelly, people would squat in it for a long time and smell the stench, which was definitely not good for the body. If there was no nozzle to wash the chrysanthemum, the chrysanthemum would definitely not be clean, which would lead to hemorrhoids sooner or later, and even other complications. The consequences were unimaginable.
What was the most important thing for a person? Of course, it was his or her own body. The body was the capital of revolution. Only with a body could one have everything. Without a body, one would really have nothing. Therefore, for the sake of one's health, it was necessary to invest heavily in the washroom and kitchen at home. The front door and the main hall were similar, and there was no need to invest too much. In this way, one could be more low-key and not appear to be so conspicuous.
The front door and the main hall of Ang Lee's mansion were very ordinary. The investment was not high, far less than the investment in the washroom and kitchen. The kitchen cost more because it was big enough. The stone platform was made of wheat rice stone, which was not easy to produce bacteria, the stove was made of environmentally friendly materials, and the bowls and chopsticks were of the best quality. The silver bowls and chopsticks, as well as the jade bowls and chopsticks, cost a lot.
On the other hand, the washroom cost a lot. One of the reasons was that the auxiliary washing equipment was more expensive. The tall special water tower and water pipes cost a lot of money, and it also had to be warm and waterproof. The walls of the washroom also had to be made of water-resistant and corrosion-resistant jade. It would be strange if it was not expensive. Even for the floor of the main hall, Ang Lee was not willing to use jade. Instead, he used very ordinary granite. This made many guests who had been to Ang Lee's washroom unable to distinguish where the main hall was.
Many people thought that Ang Lee was deliberately keeping a low profile and did not want to be too ostentatious. Therefore, the front door and the main hall were more ordinary. Or they thought that Ang Lee liked to hide his wealth and did not like to show off his resources. He liked to hide his wealth and slowly admire it. However, no one knew that Ang Lee was doing this for his own health. He was a person who valued his health more than anything else. Obviously, they all guessed wrong. No one could truly understand Ang Lee, which made Ang Lee feel quite lonely.
In Ang Lee's heart, people who spent all their money on the front door and the main hall were high-profile people who puffed themselves up at their own cost. This was very wrong behavior, especially for ordinary small rich families. It was completely unnecessary to spend a lot of money to renovate the front door and the main hall. In fact, it was completely unnecessary to spend a lot of money to renovate the front door and the main hall. Saving the money in these two aspects would allow them to renovate the toilet room and the kitchen very well. These two things were really able to improve their quality of life.
According to Ang Lee's vision, the kitchen and the toilet room should be bigger in the entire house. They should be the size of the bedroom so that it would be comfortable to live in. It would be perfect to have two independent toilet rooms so that when two people needed to go to the toilet at the same time, they did not have to wait. After all, waiting to hold their bowels was very harmful to the body. If they held their bowels back, it would be even more harmful to the body. After holding their bowels back, if there was a situation where they did not want to go to the toilet for many days, it would be even more serious constipation. It was a kind of physical disease that was very harmful to the body. The reason for this disease was that there were no more toilet rooms in the house, so it was really necessary to have one more toilet room.
Under the same area, if the kitchen and the toilet room were increased in size, the bedroom would not be enough. This was also very easy to solve. They could just cancel one bedroom, change the three bedrooms to two bedrooms, change the four bedrooms to three bedrooms, or reduce the size of the living room. This would be more comfortable to live in.
For an ordinary resident, the living room was the most useless. It was meaningless if it was too big. Who would have guests coming to their house every day? It was enough to have a sofa to lie on. If they were happy, they could directly change the living room into a bedroom. It was not a big deal. The guests could just go to the hotel to eat, drink, and have fun.
In the Tang dynasty, the luxury of the gate and the main hall, as well as the dirty workshop and kitchen, reflected the concept of the people of this era. They paid more attention to the face and ignored the inner things. They ignored the things that could really improve the quality of life. No one even dared to change anything. Otherwise, they would be criticized by others for not doing their job properly.
A craftsman would study how to make the gate more imposing and how to make the main hall more dignified. This was the proper business of the craftsmen of this era. No one would spend too much effort on the toilet room and kitchen. There were very few patterns. For example, in the toilet room, even the richest family would at most prepare a toilet bowl sprinkled with petals to cover up the stench, or get some small dates to stuff in the nose to reduce the stench. These measures were enough to show that the toilets of these rich families were very smelly. At least, they could not solve the problem of the stench when they were going to the toilet.
After Ang Lee invented the water flushing toilet, this problem was easier to solve. He flushed it a little bit when it came out, so that the stink in the toilet room would not spread out for a long time. In this way, the smell in the toilet room would be much less. In addition, with the special ventilation window, the effect was even better. The problem of washing the chrysanthemum in time was also solved. This could be called an epoch-making progress.
Such a huge improvement naturally couldn't be hidden from others. Therefore, a considerable portion of the chambers used by the nobles in the capital and the nobles in the palace had been transformed into the type that Li An had invented. As long as the conditions permitted, they would do so. After all, which noble wouldn't want to enjoy it?
Of course, there were also some people who were not optimistic. They felt that it was too wasteful. It was just a small matter to go to the toilet. It was actually a waste to spend so much money to transform it. How could people who did not have hemorrhoids understand the pain of those who had? It was a kind of pain that made one have nothing to live for! It was so painful that it could not be more painful.
However, due to Li An's advanced invention, the construction and maintenance costs of the Gong Room were too high. Therefore, the average person was destined to be unable to afford it. They did not have the financial resources, nor did they have the conditions to afford it. Some of the smaller aristocrats who lived in crowded houses were also unable to afford it. After all, their houses had so much space. Building a water tower and storing water all required land resources. If the house did not have enough land, it would be very inappropriate to build a large Gong Room. For example, it was clearly unreasonable to build a Gong Room that was ten square meters large in a 30-square-meter house in the future. It would require an area of at least 150 square meters to build a fully functional Gong Room and fulfill the requirement of having all the necessary facilities.
The workshop of Ang Lee's house had enough dormitories. Many craftsmen lived there. In order to take care of the daily lives of these craftsmen, the accommodation had a special dining hall and toilet room. Although the tables, chairs, and stone tables in the dining hall were not as luxurious as those in Ang Lee's house, they were still clean and tidy. The toilet room did not have special equipment for washing chrysanthemums, but it could be used as a flushing toilet, which was much better than other workshops.
In order to make up for the lack of washing equipment in the toilet room, the accommodation of Ang Lee's house had bathhouses. These bathhouses were open every day so that the craftsmen could take a comfortable hot bath after a hard day's work. At the same time, they could wash their chrysanthemums, which was very beneficial to their health. This was a relatively common treatment in the future. Unfortunately, the workshops of the Tang dynasty did not have such good treatment.
Many craftsmen who chose to go home would also take a bath before going home to relax themselves. This was the case for the male craftsmen, and it was the same for the female craftsmen who were in charge of the female craftsmen's workshop. They also had a bathhouse, and it was more advanced. In order to prevent infectious diseases, they basically used a shower to wash their faces. For this reason, they had to use a large amount of water and fuel every day. However, these investments were worth it as it would increase the craftsmen's satisfaction. Moreover, all the workshops were profitable and did not become unprofitable because of these additional investments. Investing in these benefits did not affect the fact that the workshops were making a lot of money.
The purpose of the women's initial intention of building a workshop was that they were too bored and wanted to do something. After that, they had a sense of responsibility. They wanted to provide work opportunities for the women in the capital, so that they could earn money and share the burden of the whole family. They could also become useful people.
Motivated by this sense of responsibility, the madams expanded from the initial workshop to more workshops, such as tea, clothing, toys, and labor protection. These workshops were all set up one after another.
Among these workshops, the initial tea made more money, but the profits of the later workshops were not ideal. However, these workshops could solve a lot of labor problems. Therefore, the women decided to open these workshops to solve the employment problem of more women in the capital.
Some workshops had good business all year round, but there were also workshops with certain seasons. They would be divided into the peak season and off-peak season. During the peak season, business was booming, and customers would come to the door before production. During the off-peak season, there was almost no business.
In addition, there were some new things that needed to be opened up. For example, labor protection products were invented by Ang Lee. These labor protection products were invented by Ang Lee in order to provide good labor protection for ordinary workers and prevent workers from getting injured.
The simplest was the safety helmet. It was not that this did not exist in ancient times, but under normal circumstances, only the army on the battlefield would prepare helmets to prevent head injuries. Generally, the craftsmen who worked did not have a helmet to protect their heads. They even felt that it was superfluous and cumbersome. After all, no matter how good the protective equipment was, it still had weight. Would it be comfortable to wear something heavy on the head? Especially the farmers, they were even more unwilling to wear a protective helmet on their heads.
The craftsmen in the workshop were already working very hard. Naturally, they were not willing to wear a protective helmet. The probability of injury was not high, and no one would care about these low probability injuries.
However, since the Tang dynasty had four or five story buildings, the working environment of the craftsmen responsible for building the buildings was full of danger. If they were not careful, a small stone might fall from above. These small stones would not only hurt the head, but they could even directly knock people out. In the era of two or three story wooden buildings, the probability of this happening was very small, but now, the probability of this happening was very high. Therefore, the use of safety helmets was quite urgent. Ang Lee suggested that his wife open a labor protection workshop that mainly produced safety helmets. In addition to safety helmets, they also had to produce masks and gloves to protect the craftsmen.
In the beginning, it was naturally not recognized, and the safety helmets could not be sold. However, as more and more people were injured in the construction site, people gradually recognized it. The foremen were also willing to spend a little money to buy safety helmets. After all, once the craftsmen were injured in the head, not only would the foremen have to pay for a lot of medical expenses, but it would also delay the craftsmen's work. It was a big loss. In order to avoid injury, spending a little more money was nothing.
Then there were protective equipment such as masks and gloves. For the people working in the flour and cement workshop, dust was a very troublesome problem. Masks could more or less solve a part of the problem, so as to protect the craftsmen's health and increase the efficiency of their work. It was a good thing to kill two birds with one stone.
Gloves were mainly used to protect the palms. When working, especially when working for a long time, the palms were easy to get injured, and cracking and bleeding were very common. Although the craftsmen who could bear hardships could continue working even if their palms were cracked, their efficiency would definitely be reduced if their palms were to bleed. This would directly lead to the loss of the employer's interests. Therefore, in order to let the craftsmen work better, it was very necessary to equip the craftsmen with the necessary palm protection. It seemed to cost a little money, but in fact, it was a profitable business.
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