In the Chinese megalopolis, shopping malls
compete in home style, and the western brands rush to target the quite new middle
class of the country. Our Report is on this El Dorado of the luxury.
Shanghai, the paradise of
brands
«Here, it
is the paradise of the brands! » exclaims a young woman by smiling. The
paradise has the size of a cathedral. It soaks in a cotton silence hardly
disturbed by a pianist who always plays the same air. The most prestigious shop
showcases follow one another as for a parade: Prada, Hermes, Dior, Loewe,
Cartier, Celine, and Louis Vuitton,lapoigneedemain... The paradise is a shopping mall, Plaza
66. Welcome to Shanghai, the city of the two thousand towers, symbol of modern China
in full take-off which gets tipsy on shopping.
In front of
the door of Plaza 66 extends Nanjing Road which, from east to west, aligns all
the categories of shops, the cheap in the style. They are opened seven days a
week, till 10 pm. Girls and boys raise red hair henna or blond straw. Nice and
clean couples hold the hand of their only, necessarily unique child. There is
also, appeared from another world, old sir in jacket Mao worn thin walk slowly.
Consulting in Shanghai
It is
hardly pushed aside by a woman with the tanned face which carries in balance of
the piles of vegetables in baskets of bamboo. At day fall, mothers appear back
trees, brandishing their children with the empty eyes which hang on to the
passers-by for some Yuan. But, the weekend, on Nanjing Road, about two million
people go window-shopping. Here, the El Dorado has to meet its paradoxes.
On Nanjing
Road, huge posters praise the value of the most powerful cosmetic brands.
Virginie Ledoyen and Laetitia Casta (French celebrities), all smiles on panels -
advertisement Paris L'Oréal, are next to an immense advertising Dior Capture.
Just in front of Plaza 66, Lancôme settled last June a Zen shop; it is the replica
of the one which opened a few months later in Paris.
