HK Luxury Shopping Heaven

There are two things people in HK know how to do well – eat and shop. For a small island, they certainly have packed as many shops and shopping centres into every any available space – I don’t think you can walk through a street in the city centre without walking past a shop or a mall.

If you are a mum visiting HK with a pram (as I was) you cannot cross many of the streets of HK without going through a shopping mall. I am not kidding!!  Where we were staying (at Admiralty in HK island) there were no crossways for pedestrians on wheels, so in order to cross the street you have to walk into a building, go through their shopping centre and take an elevator to the floor that has the overground pedestrian walkways that lead you to yet another shopping mall which is on the street you want to go to – crazy, I know!!

But, as I was visiting HK on a leisurely trip with my son while my poor husband worked his butt off (people living in HK are also workaholics), I didn’t mind walking around and window shopping the endless beautiful designer shops and boutiques.

We were staying at the Conrad Hilton Hotel in Admiratly, which is on top of one of the newest Shopping Complexes in HK, the Pacific Place Shopping Centre (the complex also houses Shangri-La and JV Marriott hotels).

Pacific Place Shopping Centre – four beautifully styled floors filled with all the international luxury brands you can think of as well as two luxury department stores. HK’s premier department store, Lane Crawford (with designers like Lanvin, Alexander Mcqueen, Givenchy, Thakoon).. and Harvey Nichols.

All the most beautiful international luxury designers under one roof..
On Level 3, you have all the jewellery designers including Bvulgari, Cartier, Chopard, Piaget, Tiffany & Co, Richard Milli, Van Cleef & Arples. Luxury clothing and accessories designers include Burberry, Celini, Chanel, Chloe, Dior Emilio Pucci, Gucci, Hermes, Miu Miu, Prada, Salvatore Ferrugamo, Versace, Louis Vouitton.. Walking from one luxury boutique to another I was drooling over all the beautiful designs.. it was seriously walking through designer heaven, I was like a little girl in a candy store again.. except the little girl didn’t have enough pennies to buy her candy!! Unfortunately the HK prices seem quite inflated compared to designer shopping in UK/ Europe. Still, I still was on a high from the window shopping! 😉

On Level 2 you have the luxury designers that didn’t fit onto the bigger luxury space of the top floor including Acquascutum, Bally, Diane Von Fustenberg, Emporio Armani, Hugo Bosso, IT (a Local HK boutique chain selling cutting edge fashion), D&G, Hogan, Joyce (another local HK boutique selling amazing designers including Balenciaga, Balmain, Philip Lim, Rodarte), Just Cavalli, Marc, Shanhai Tang, Vivienne Tam, Zadig & Voltare.
On Level 1 you have the funkier Streetwear labels including Armani Exchange, Agnes B, French Connection, Kookai, Ted Baker and Zara.
On the lower ground floor you will find the best international restaurants and patisseries, including Cova (patisserie founded in Milan in 1817 on the conrner of famous Piazza della Scala), Peking Garden (a very posh contemporary version of Beijing cuisine), La Maison du Chocolat (hand made chocolates from Parisian Artisan), Roka (Japanese Robata Grill), Thai Basil (Northern Thai Cuisine), Ye Shanghai (Modern contemporary Chinese) and Zen (best of Chinese fine dining).

I had the pleasure of dining in Roka, which was originally in London (I always wanted to go to Rocca in London’s Charlotte St but could never get a booking) – the freshest sushi and sashimi and beautiful robata grill.

I also tried Thai Basil, beautiful Norther Thai Cuisine, I ordered the most tasty chilli crab I have ever tasted!!

(Note it is in a box as I had to eat it takeaway – it is not easy eating a takeaway chili crab in your hotel room.. my bed ended up having chili on it!) Beautifully, meaty and very spicy, I had chilly and spice all over my fingers – luckily I was not eating in public so I wasn’t ashamed to lick my fingers in the end! 😉

Zen offered good quality yum cha (HKsiders love those dumplings!) – very nice to have good quality dumplings in a very funky and chic setting.

Peking Garden offered Beijing Cuisine served with old colonial English decor.

With all those hundreds of designer shops and all the beautiful food literally under one roof (and the roof being under my lovely hotel), I was definitely spoilt for choice.. making it a wonderful and memorable shopping trip. If you’re ever in HK looking for luxury designer shopping, get lost in the shopping heaven that is Pacific Place.. just be sure to have your credit cards ready! 😉