Former French Concession

You are in the heart of Shanghai’s former French Concession, created in 1849 as a foreign enclave and, a century later, one of the city’s most elegant and emblematic districts, where every street seems to echo a fragment of history. The straight boulevards lined with plane trees, the European-inspired villas, and especially the shikumen- the stone-gated houses, form a unique urban landscape. Behind their façades a maze of alleys, the longtang, once created small communities where daily life unfolded around shared courtyards. Not far from here lies Huaihai Middle Road, the former Avenue Joffre once nicknamed the Champs-Élysées of Shanghai, whose elegant boutiques, theatres and Art Deco façades bring to mind the cosmopolitan energy of the roaring twenties. Further west, Wukang Road lines up a series of historic villas and is home to the district’s most iconic building, the flatiron-shaped Wukang Building designed by architect László Hudec. Two places capture the spirit of the French Concession especially well: Xintiandi, where former shikumen blocks have been restored and transformed into a lively area blending traditional architecture with contemporary design, filled with restaurants, galleries, museums and the house where the Chinese Communist Party was founded in 1921, and Tianzifang, more intimate and bohemian, where narrow, still-inhabited lanes shelter artists’ studios, cafés and small shops in a warm, bustling atmosphere. For a moment of calm, Fuxing Park provides a peaceful break in the middle of the city, designed in the French style and coming to life at dawn with tai chi, afternoon dancing and quiet conversations beneath the plane trees. All around, several charming house-museums recall important figures in the country’s history, including Sun Yat-sen and Soong Ching-ling.