Tianzifang

The Taikang Road Main Entrance sits at Lane 210, Taikang Road, the southern end of Tianzifang. The archway is built of bluestone, with the characters "Tianzifang" calligraphed by the renowned Chinese painter Huang Yongyu. Right by the entrance is a small cultural-creative gift shop and a popular photo wall where visitors queue year-round for pictures. Stepping through, you step into the shikumen lilong cluster and creative boutiques — the first movement of Tianzifang's "old Shanghai, new art" mood.

The Shikumen lilong area is the historic heart of Tianzifang, covering about 7.2 hectares. Most shikumen houses were built in the 1920s—1930s: red-brick plaster walls, black-lacquered wooden doors, brass knockers, semi-circular or Baroque carved lintels, with sky-bridges and wing-rooms staggered along narrow lanes. The buildings have been converted into creative shops, galleries, cafés and designer studios, but the original façades remain largely intact. Walking along Lanes 210 / 248 / 274, you'll see laundry poles, cast-iron window grilles and old shikumen plaques — the best living slice of Shanghai's "alley-meets-modern" character.

The former studio sits at 2-A, Lane 210, Taikang Road, a two-storey shikumen building of about 170 square meters. From 1998 until his death in 2005, the celebrated oil painter Chen Yifei worked here, completing several major series including "Old Shanghai Dreams" and "Ladies." The studio's signature is its tangle of overhead wires and mismatched window shapes against the sky. Since October 2025, the Shanghai and Huangpu governments have jointly opened the space to the public for free, restoring it to its working-condition look. Visitors can see easels, oil paints, original catalogues, and letters — a must-visit for art lovers and Chen Yifei fans.

Located inside Lane 210, Taikang Road, Shoubai Art Center was founded by Hai pai painter and paper-cutting artist Li Shoubai. The center regularly displays Li Shoubai's heavy-color paintings and paper-cut works themed on old Shanghai street scenes, qipao, opera, and everyday life — vivid colors and rich compositions. The first floor houses the exhibition and creative-retail zone; the second floor often hosts interactive workshops (paper-cutting, woodblock printing, fan painting, etc.) where visitors can try intangible cultural heritage hands-on. The center also regularly invites domestic and overseas artists for joint exhibitions and lectures — a day-into-night cultural parlor.

The "Painter's Building" is a shikumen-converted artists' residence deep inside Lane 210, Taikang Road, with ground and first floors housing galleries, studios and creative shops. The rooftop is open to visitors and offers a wide panoramic view: to the east, the urban skyline toward Dapuqiao; to the south, an unbroken sea of red-tile shikumen roofs laced with black overhead wires — the classic "old Shanghai" sightline; to the west, occasional glimpses of distant high-rises. Many photographers come specifically for the "red tiles + skyscrapers" contrast, especially at sunset. Pair it with the retro phone booth, graffiti wall, and narrow lanes for the full Tianzifang photo trail.

The Odor Library (the Chinese partner of the US Demeter Fragrance Library brand) sits inside Lane 248, Taikang Road, and is one of China's earliest homegrown brands to turn "city scents," "childhood memories," and "emotional scents" into bottled perfumes. The compact shop displays dozens of thematically named fragrances on its walls — "Garden After Rain," "Old Book Page," "Grandma's Kitchen," "Old Shanghai Lane" — each tied to a concrete scene or memory. Customers can freely sniff, commission a custom scent, or pick up 30ml travel-size gift boxes. For travelers who believe a city can be captured by smell, it is Tianzifang's most distinctive "olfactory souvenir" stop.

Tucked deep inside Lane 248, Taikang Road, Jin Fen Shi Jia is one of Tianzifang's longest-running and most reputable qipao + retro photo studios. The shop stocks dozens of old-Shanghai qipao (silk, velvet, linen-cotton), plus men's changshan, mandarin jackets, student uniforms, and vintage accessories. Customers can try them on, then be photographed by a pro in the studio or out in the lilong lanes — with retro phone booths, vintage bicycles and gramophones as classic props. The shop also rents costumes and props for self-shooters. Whether you want an "old Shanghai family portrait" or a "qipao shoot with the girls," Jin Fen Shi Jia is one of the most reliable choices in Tianzifang.

Lane 248 is one of Tianzifang's three principal lanes (the others being Lanes 210 and 274), running north from Taikang Road for about 200 meters. Lined with dozens of original designer shops, hand-made leather ateliers, independent bookstores, vintage silverware stores, and small cafés/dessert spots, Lane 248 is narrower and quieter than the main 210 Lane, ideal for slow wandering. You can often watch designers hand-finishing leather goods, blending perfume, or throwing pottery inside the shops. Street performers — accordion, hand drum — regularly play at the lane mouth, lending the space a free, easy-going mood.

Lane 274 is the northernmost of Tianzifang's three main lanes, connecting Taikang Road in the south to Jianguo Middle Road in the north. It is the most "art-saturated" of the three, lined with contemporary galleries (Base Art Center, Ren Weiyin Painting Museum, and others), emerging-artist studios, independent publishers, photography galleries, and small art-book cafés. It hosts numerous solo, group, video, and salon-style exhibitions each year; some galleries are free, others charge 20—50 RMB/visit or require a drink voucher. Many gallery façades are regularly repainted with new large-scale graffiti and installations, making Lane 274 a "see-shoot-wander" all-in-one core section of Tianzifang.