Asia > China > Shanghai > Shanghai > Articles > Shanghai Raises the Bar

High heels, check. Summer frock, check. Fat wallet, check. While you can hang out in bland Shanghai restaurants knocking back 30-cent Tsing Tao beer and budget dumplings, there’s another show going on in town, and it’s glittering with Shanghai style.

The city’s always had a soft spot for expats, just take a look at the Bund, a strip of elegant neo-classical mansions along the Huangpu River, which would be at home in Stockholm or London. Once the site of the various ‘concessions’, where expats carved out chunks of prime land for their businesses and homes, it’s also not a bad place to start trawling Shanghai’s best bars.

On a mid-week evening, Bar Rouge is pumping with a mix of suave Shanghaiese, well-heeled expats from every corner of the globe and a few tourists, such as ourselves. The cherry on the top floor of No. 18 on the Bund, its co-inhabitants include a Cartier salon, Sens & Bund restaurant and Venetian glass absolutely everywhere. Designed by Imaad Rahmouni, who has sat at the feet of uber-designer Philippe Starck, it’s the St Tropez of the Bund, and one of the city’s most elite and gay-friendly bars on the strip. Be warned, don’t be waltzing in here with your velcro sandals and Billabongs. Chances are they’ll hustle you back into the elegant lifts before you can say, “Two mango mojitos, please!” The look is chic and playful for the girls, tanned and immaculately groomed for men.

For the best seat in the house, either come early (though the bar didn’t heat up till after 11pm the night we visited) or ring ahead to secure your posse in a cabana or one of the four-poster beds scattered about the open rooftop. Embroidered with the Moet & Chandon insignia, you can prop yourself up with pillows to gaze out over the Huangpo River to the forest of high-rises that make up the new suburb of Pudong, spearheaded by an oversized toothpick and the symbol of nouveau Shanghai, the Oriental Pearl TV tower.

Other bars, other moods. On my research mission this night, New Heights at No. 3 the Bund had a far more Asian clientele – Hong Kong heiresses tossed locks and looks at Italian suits and the viewtastic terrace was pumping. It’s set above Aussie chef David Laris’ self-named Shanghai pile amidst acres of sparkling Carrera marble, which includes a sublime chocolate bar, a raw bar and mouthwatering wine racks in cosy Vault. Other tenants in No. 3 include an Evian spa and Armani. If you could choose your neighbours…

Two doors up at No. 5, rival bar Glamour is the latest addition to the empire of another Australian restaurateur, Michelle Garnaut, she of M on the Bund restaurant fame, for fine dining or Sunday afternoon scones and clotted cream. Glamour’s cocktail list includes the romantically-named Moon at the Bottom of the Pond (Cointreau, champagne and lemon sorbet) and the winner of the 1951 martini competition in Chicago, the classic gin martini with a soupcon of Cointreau and an anchovy-stuffed olive.

We nipped in for an early post-dinner drink, only to find half of country NSW in here doing the same. If I wanted the Wagga footy scores while in China, this was gonna be the place to get them. Having said that, W’s elegant entertainment program, which that month included a chat with chef Kylie Kwong, Chinese lessons and a classical piano recital, could lure me back next time.

But it’s not all about the Bund. Half the fun is getting off the rutted Anglo track and flexing those map-reading muscles. Taxis are cheap, plentiful and the soundtrack’s better now drivers have been compelled to spit into little government-issue sacks, rather than hawking it out onto the street.

Shanghai is in the throes of a torrid love affair with curtains of Swarovski crystals and Italian chandeliers, which hang from every conceivable surface throughout the city’s bars including, memorably, the loos of the art bar TMSK, which opened in May last year.

From 10am-8pm, TMSK is a gallery and museum for the ornate traditional Chinese LiuLi glass contortions collected by ‘80s movie star Loretta Hui-Shan Yang. Then at 8pm, it does a premature Cinderella when the glass-top jewellery counters become bars, and drinks are raised amongst the artworks, which extend even to the vessels you’re drinking from. Mind you, with Jacob’s Creek reds, you’d want the royal treatment.

The ultimate tourist bar is Cloud 9, perched, as the name indicates, on the 87th floor above the Shanghai Grand Hyatt. Open from 6pm weekdays and 11am weekends, from your vantage point 152 meters above ground, Shanghai is spread out like a carpet below, with high points including the building where Tom dangled from in Mission Impossible 3, the Super Brand Mall, said to be China’s largest (a title most likely superseded by now) mall, and the 101-storey building under construction next door, as financiers compete for the grandeur of building this year’s tallest building.

Then there’s The Face, one of the old favourites for its unShanghai setting in a 1930s chateau amidst leafy gardens in the French concession, with tables scattered out in the open air. It’s a little bit Rajisthani, a little bit rock’n’roll, with a small maiden bed and an opium bed in the bar, which you can call ahead to book your lounging time, and well-regarded Thai and Indian restaurants, though pricey by local standards.

“Shanghai is going the way of Hong Kong or Bangkok,” says Face Bar’s Albert Ho. “There’s so much energy, it’s just in your face.” No pun in tended, but it’s true.

The bar scene doesn’t stop. Barbarossa is a super-sexy Moroccan-style bar set on a lake within the People’s Park off Nanjing Road. So slick it hurts, this hip bar serves up honey and mandarin mojitos in its open-air pavilion, long taffeta curtains flickering in the breeze. In comparison, the newest bars to flip their doors are harking back to old Shanghai – take the New Factories complex in Jing’an, where 1920s shells are stripped back to their bare roots then dolled up with a liberal amounts of chandeliers in dark, sultry rooms owned by more local movie stars.

But for the sweet smell of opium and the scent of old-school capitalism, there is no better place than YongFoo Elite. As the name suggests, it’s not a place to wander in off the street. Call or email the former British consulate first for afternoon tea, drinks or dinner, and expect to pay an entrance fee. So why bother?

Set in the embassy district, the club’s constantly on the city’s hottest must-do lists. The Louis-style chairs have supported the buttocks of everyone from the King of Luxembourg to Jackie Chan. Tom C has lounged in the vintage Gucci sofas or on the Ming dynasty beds, real estate moguls giggled with Chinese actresses as they leaned against crystal columns or walls of gold leaf or perched on the white wrought-iron French-style chair collected beneath a massive magnolia tree in the villa’s gardens. More Venetian glass chandeliers, more opium beds on the lawn.

There’s plenty we’ve missed, the Ice Bar, Baby Face, CJW, or clubby Monsoon. They’re slick, they’re chic, they’re Shanghai on endorphins but you’d probably end up with cirrhosis in the name of investigative journalism. However, you can try. So slip a parasol in your drink, an orchid in your hair and toast Shanghai style.

Trip notes
• Grab a copy of Wallpaper’s hot pink City Guide: Shanghai to help steer your way to the city’s hottest spots.
• If your Mandarin fails but your phone works, text 85880 with the name of your bar to receive a translation for your taxi driver.
• Virgin Atlantic flies Sydney to Hong Kong daily, www.virginatlantic.com.au with connections to Shanghai via Dragonair, 131 747, www.dragonair.com • Travel Indochina runs tours of China including their 10-day Highlights of China, www.travelindochina.com.au
The hit list
Barbarossa, 231 Nanjing Rd West
Bar Rouge, 7th floor, 18 The Bund
Cloud 9, Jin Mao Tower, Pudong
Face Bar 118 Fui Jin 2 Rd
New Heights, 7th floor, 3 The Bund
The Glamour Bar, 6th floor, 5 The Bund
TMSK99, 1266 West Nanjing Rd
YongFoo Elite, 200 Yongfu Rd

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