City Shopping Center: Zhongshan Wu Lu - Beijing Lu

All-around and up-to-date shopping area

There is a frenzied shopping matrix located at the city center, and Beijing Lu (北京路) is at the heart of it. As Guangzhou's neon-lit answer to Shanghai's Nanjing Street or Beijing's Wangfujing Street, Beijing Lu is where GZ youth go to buy sensible, mid-range Hong Kong clothes and increasingly garish local brands. Noisy and fun, this popular pedestrianized area is also replete with cheap food stalls, cafés and ubiquitous fast-food chains like KFC and McDonald's.

With over ten large and medium sized shopping centers such as Xindaxin (新大新) and Grandbuy (广百), Beijing Lu is also home to several 'themed' bookstores that run the gamut from dictionaries to music to children's books. The Changjiang Musical Instruments Store (长江琴行), Yanfang Photo Studio (艳芳照相馆) and the Sanduoxuan (三多轩) and Jiya-zhai Studios (集雅斋) – which feature traditional Chinese stationary, paintings and calligraphy – can also be found there.

At the northern end of the road stands the Hong Kong Mall, where storekeepers sell original foreign-brand clothes, accessories and cosmetics from our neighbor to the south.

Ancient pavements are shown underground permanently on Beijing Lu.

Crossing over the north end of Beijing Lu stretches Zhongshan Wu Lu (中山六路), a lively copy of Beijing Lu that has not been pedestrianized. There, the Xindaxin Department Store and newly-built Mayflower Plaza (五月花广场) – a bustling connection to the Gongyuanqian (公园前) subway station – feature a variety of vogue merchandise and fashionable brands.

Xihu (西湖) and Huifudong (惠福东) are two other Beijing Lu crossings that offer many shopping options, including the Mingsheng Mall (名胜广场) on Xihu and a large selection of children's stores on Huifudong.

Running parallel to Beijing Lu lies Wende Lu (文德路), an area packed with shops carrying copies of paintings, photos, frames and various other items for home decoration.

Places:

Grandbuy (Guangzhou Merchandise) Department Store
Xindaxin Department Store
Mayflower Plaza

(By Ronald Li and Stephen Roach)

Source: Lifeofguangzhou.com

Editor: Ronald Li