[Photo provided to China Daily]

Under the agreement, a landmark exhibition called Forbidden City: Imperial Treasures from the Palace Museum, Beijing, was held at VMFA from October 2014 to January 2015.

"As the Palace Museum was so generous with us, we thought we should give something back to them ..."

With the ongoing exhibition, the Faberge treasures from VMFA are outside North America for the first time, and this is also the first exhibition at the Palace Museum displaying exhibits from a US museum.

Lou Wei, deputy director of the Palace Museum, says it has also begun to contact other US museums to bring their collections to the Chinese public.

"We have two criteria for exhibitions from overseas: One is to cooperate with the world's top museums," says Lou. "And, the other is to bring exhibits from foreign royal families that echo with the aura of the Forbidden City."

Exhibitions displaying royal objects from India, Germany and Spain have been held at the museum since 2005, and Lou says more will follow the Faberge show.

Museum director Shan Jixiang says the Meridian Gate Gallery, which is situated by the entrance of the Forbidden City, will become a major venue hosting heavyweight overseas exhibitions in the future.

If you go

Faberge Revealed

8:30 am-4:30 pm, Mondays closed, through July 17.

Meridian Gate (Wu Men) Gallery, Palace Museum, 4 Jingshan Qianjie, Dongcheng district, Beijing.

Entrance ticket to the museum is 60 yuan ($9.30).

Visit www.dpm.org.cn for more information.