Four months ago a group of Irish, English and Chinese artisans began converting an old warehouse in a laneway in Beijing's Sanlitun district.
The Chinese workers were often puzzled at what they were asked to do. An interior wall was painted yellow and then sprayed here and there a rusty red colour to make it look old, new wooden floors were "distressed" to look as if they were laid a century ago, bookshelves were erected high up on the walls out of reach.
When it was finished, an image of a randy old crone with a drink in her hand was painted on an interior wall. Then dusty ledgers were placed on the bookshelves, a scythe was hung here, a picture of Michael Collins there, and - hey presto! Beijing had its first Irish pub.
The arrival in the Chinese capital of Durty Nellie's, founded jointly by a group of English and Irish investors and a Chinese company called Shibo, means that a last bastion has fallen in Asia.
You can already find Irish pubs almost everywhere in the orient, in Singapore, Hong Kong, Seoul, Kuala Lumpur, Manila, Tokyo, Bangkok - even Phnom Penh and Ho Chi Min City. Every day last year an Irish theme pub opened somewhere in the world.
The capitulation of Beijing was inevitable. The wonder is that it took so long. The Sanlitun district over the last three years has acquired dozens of little bars and cafes, and not far away there is a well-established English pub called the John Bull.
The staff in the John Bull are all Chinese but Durty Nellie's will always have an Irish bartender as well as Chinese staff, said the manager, Christopher Reid (29), from Killiney, who worked for an Irish bar in Dusseldorf and arrived in China just last week to run the pub for a year or so.
The essential conditions for a successful Irish pub, he told me, are Irish staff, Irish music, Irish beer (it has Guinness and Kilkenny on tap) and Irish food (the menu boasts leek and potato soup, Irish stew and smoked salmon salad).
"People who find it accidentally are amazed to get a pint of Guinness in Beijing served by an Irishman," said Robert Pitt (27) from Dalkey, the pub's builder, designer and trouble-shooter as he describes himself.
Robert, who spent the last five years in the Irish pub business in Prague, had nothing but praise for the Chinese workers. "I would tell them what I wanted, but not how to do it, because they have their own methods and tools, and they got the same result," he said.
Durty Nellie's isn't the first Irish bar in China - that honour belongs to O'Malley's in Shanghai which combines many of the usual Irish pub themes - cottage pub with stone floor; the grocer's shop pub, the Dublin Victorian pub with bevelled mirrors, the fishing pub draped with nets.
But the Beijing variant is just a big rambling Irish bar with back rooms and alcoves and snugs which might be found at any crossroads on the N7 from Dublin to Limerick, which is why I liked it so much at first sight.
The formula is certainly proving an instant hit. Five hundred pint drinkers - , Irish, English, American, Australian, Canadian and a few Chinese , - crowded in on Friday evening as word spread throughout Beijing's expatriate community.
"It's surprising when you open an Irish pub how many Irish come out of woodwork," said Christopher. Local people have been dropping in to have a look and taste the Guinness, which is imported from Malaysia, though at 60 yuan (£5.50) a pint it is a bit expensive for local Chinese pockets.
There are several apartment blocks nearby and the pub staff are anxious not to create a nuisance for Chinese residents. The tone of the establishment is set in an Oscar Wilde quotation on the wall: "Arguments are to be avoided. They are often vulgar and often convincing."
Coincidentally, both Robert Pitt and Christopher Reid started their pub careers in the Dalkey Island Hotel, which is currently being demolished for development.
They can reminisce about that next week with another Dubliner who is expected to drop in for a pint. Bertie Ahern, who arrives in Beijing on September 14th, is the first Taoiseach to visit China.
Can it be coincidence that this long-overdue historic event was delayed until just after the opening of the first Irish pub?