Jetsetter: Haute Hong Kong

Sarah Bancroft lands in fashion paradise.

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Shop | Good to Know | Dine | Sleep | Nightcap

A visit to Hong Kong guarantees couture shock. With zero sales tax and a thriving mistress market (men buy in twos), it hosted the first-ever Chanel haute couture show outside Paris and officially has the luxury shopper by her Prada purse strings. Her real Prada purse strings, that is—the counterfeit market has largely moved to the mainland and Taiwan as Chanel, Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Chloé, Miu Miu, Jean Paul Gaultier and Harvey Nichols have unveiled locations in the city over the past couple years. With the first Asian outpost of British concierge service Quintessentially connecting all the glittering dots, our Western editor, Sarah Bancroft, checks in to check out the island city’s thriving nightlife, weekly society balls, summer-long shopping festival and humming evening markets.

SHOP

BRAND NEW
210,000 LED lights on the façade of the new Chanel flagship make it visible for miles. Its jewellery and watch boutiques an homage to Coco’s Ritz Paris apartment, it has a 32-metre string of glass pearls cascading through the three levels, and a diamond-dust portrait of the designer herself.

BUY DESIGN
Canadian firm Yabu Pushelberg’s high-tech redesign of premium designer department store Lane Crawford at Pacific Place features iPod bars, Martha Sturdy furniture and sculptures, shoes on conveyor belts, and visual art that senses a customer’s presence and comes to life.

FETE SET
Canadian-schooled society designer Barney Cheng has opened Célébration par Barney Cheng, an ode to the fete, with gowns, silver frames and his unique glow-in-the-dark “clubbing” diamonds, inside the new Exclusivités flagship.

SCOOP Hong Kong socialites wouldn’t deign to shoulder last season’s It bag. Scoop up their Balenciaga and Chloé castoffs at Milan Station.

MADE TO MEASURE Have your dream stilettos custom-made by Billy Chan (from $200, 10 days for delivery), from thousands of choices, including white python.

GOOD TO KNOW

FLY GIRL
Cathay Pacific’s first-class passengers out of Hong Kong and Canada dine on dishes from Hong Kong’s top eight restaurants, sleep in chic black Chinese pajamas from posh department store Shanghai Tang and recover in private cabanas in the Wing lounge.

SITE TO SEE
Source the location of Hong Kong’s Comme des Garçons guerilla concept store: guerilla-store.com.

DINE

PARIS MATCH
Stop for tea and Le Goûter Bernardaud’s famous Parisian macaroons at the new IFC shopping mecca. Chocolates are flown in regularly from France.

HOT PLATE
DJs spin on Wednesdays and weekends at cool Opia, the loungey restaurant/bar tucked into Philippe Starck’s first Asian hotel project, Jia. Its fashionable laurels include being named Best Restaurant in the South China Post’s and Harpers Bazaar’s 2006 StyleAwards.

SLEEP

JETSET
The ultraluxe Island Shangri-La hotel (from $370) has partnered with Bombardier Skyjet International to offer private jet service. Upon landing, you are whisked to your immense suite in a bespoke Rolls-Royce Phantom, then dine en privé at the hotel’s impressive Restaurant Petrus, named, of course, after the world’s most exclusive wine—which it stocks.

NIGHTCAP

LUXE LOUNGE
The exotic terrace of Dragon-I, with its massive songbird cages, is the current posh perch from which to sip Veuve Clicquot, nibble Peking duck and channel Suzie Wong.

HIGH SEAS: Silversea’s (silversea.com) inclusive rate includes limitless Pommery (the house pour) and all the caviar you can eat. It’s faced by chic Isabella Rossellini, who designed her own cabin, one of which is featured in each of the line’s four vessels. Ships will ferry you from Hong Kong through Thailand, Vietnam and Singapore and finesse bespoke pre- and post-trip excursions to Cambodia.

First published in FASHION Magazine October 2006

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