He founded Shanghai Tang in 1994, initially as a Hong Kong emporium to showcase lifestyle, fashion and home products that drew on the glamour of Chinese styles of the 1920s and ’30s and gave them a more contemporary gloss. The first store, catering to tourists, soon became one of a chain: Dozens of outlets opened worldwide, from Bangkok and Singapore to London and New York.

Richemont, the Swiss luxury group and owner of such brands as Chloe, Van Cleef & Arpels and Cartier, took a stake in Shanghai Tang in 1998 and went on to acquire full ownership in 2008.

But despite attempts to position the company as a Chinese luxury brand, Shanghai Tang began to lose popularity in China; its offerings apparently failed to resonate with shoppers there. In July, Richemont announced that it had sold the company to Alessandro Battagli, an Italian businessman, for an undisclosed sum.

Known for mingling with A-listers and royalty, Mr. Tang was reputed to have the best address book in London. An accomplished pianist who could recite poetry by heart, he formed close friendships with celebrities like the actor Russell Crowe and Sarah Ferguson, the Duchess of York. He was a confidant of the supermodels Kate Moss and Naomi Campbell.

In his column for The Financial Times, which appeared on weekends, he dispensed advice on social etiquette and entertaining while peppering his answers to inquiries with outrageous anecdotes about his own experiences and those of his rich and famous friends.

When a reader asked how to request that friends turn on the central heating in their country home when accepting visitors, he responded:

“Arrive in some mountaineering gear with goggles resembling Captain Scott, and say you are practicing to go to the Antarctic and would prefer, for assimilation, to keep all your clothes on for drinks and dinner. If your feeling cold were still to go unnoticed, blow into your gloved hands, shake like a jelly in a high wind and remark that your friend’s house provides perfect conditions for training.”

In his final years, Mr. Tang became an increasingly caustic critic of how Beijing and its chosen leaders of Hong Kong had suppressed calls for greater democracy. When the territory’s chief executive, CY Leung, began his annual policy address last year by mentioning democracy but failed to follow through on how he might achieve greater pluralism, Mr. Tang went to the city’s Foreign Correspondents’ Club and delivered a blistering speech.