VISIT: 4.5-hours by high-speed train and taxi, from Beijing lies Pingyao— a wonderfully preserved  ancient city that dates back to 1824.   A UNESCO World Cultural Heritage Site, the city is surrounded by a completely intact 6km Ming dynasty city wall, and was once China’s financial capital during the 19th century until the early 20th century, when it all migrated to Shanghai.   The city now seems to mainly feed off tourism with almost every old courtyard turned into a hotel, inn, restaurant or cafe.   The area is also known by the location where Raise the Red Lantern and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was filmed.  That being said, my family and I had a wonderful visit and it was nice to see some real city life in spite of all the tourists teeming about.  The photos above caught some slices of it.

EAT: Pingyao is located in Shanxi province–the area best known for ‘dao xiao mian’ or knife-cut noodles.  These are literally made by cutting slices off of noodle dough into a big cauldron of hot bubbling water (above).  The noodles are then taken out with a slotted spoon  and poured straight into a bowl with local dark vinegar, a bit of soy,  and a bit of chopped scallions and local meat topping it off (below).  Another noodle version is ‘mao er duo mian‘ or Cat’s Ear noodle—these are made by grating chunks of the noodle dough, with the pieces resembling cat’s ears, dropping into the cauldron of water (photo below).  The noodles were tasty, but enjoyed watching them being made more than actually eating them.

STAY: We stayed at the beautiful Jing’s Residence and lucky to get the last 2 rooms available.    A 19-room boutique hotel, Jing’s Residence is owned locally and managed by Relais & Chateux.

I had a chance to talk to the owner, Yang Jing who shared with me a little bit of Jing’s Residence’s history.  The hotel lies within the old city walls and was originally a shop and residence of a silk merchant in the Qing dynasty.   The pavillions facing the street was a shop, with the 2nd floor for storage and the first courtyards for the accounting office.  Behind all of this was where the family lived.   After 1949, the property became many different things– the current restaurant and back courtyard was a motor engine manufacturer and in 1970 it became a photograph shop when nobody had cameras.   The current kitchen and back courtyards lived an elderly lady and family, who was desparate to move to the new town for a more convenient life.  The current lobby was an eye clinic and a shop selling traditional Chinese medicine.    Jing’s Residence was originally meant to be a home, but lucky for us is now a hotel.  The restoration and re-building of the property is truly amazing, looking at some of the restoration images from their website.

I appreciated all aspects of the hotel’s interior design and the attention to detail.   It’s beautifully and tastefully done combining modern comforts with traditional style with touches of the local culture and handicrafts.   Antonio Ochoa is the interior designer and Dusseldorf-based Bruno Braun, the architect who worked on the inside layout.  The pavilions and courtyards were kept as they were and only underwent repair and deep cleaning.     My favorite was the ‘coal brick’ walls in the restaurant’s private room.  Inspired by the highly-pollutant honeycomb coal bricks that are ubiquitous in China, these clay-made versions were beautifully installed as wall features in the private room.  I’m a sucker for patterns and thought these ‘coal bricks’ laid out like that was stunning.  The lobby featured another inspired wall — swatches of silk, shingled on top of each other.

The recent Spring Eco Design Fair was hosted at The Waterhouse, a boutique hotel, which in it’s past life was a 1930′s shipyard building and warehouse.  Situated in the South Bund neighborhood of the Shiliupu district, the renovations were done by the architects Neri & Hu, with interiors and furniture by Arne Jacobsen, Finn Juhl, Hans Wegner and Antonio Citterio.   The building is an interesting mix of old and new that is sincere, without trying too hard (unlike the awfully looking Cool Docks next door).   The Danish-modern interiors is effortless and calming.

Shanghai is rife with awful signage and store fronts, so it was really nice to see this simple Waterhouse hotel sign that conveys the style of the hotel and its industrial past.  I come across so many shop signs around Shanghai and Beijing that have absolutely nothing to do with what’s going on inside its walls, so it was really refreshing to see something minimalist and straight to the point.

I got as far as the first floor, and squeezed in a few shots before the hotel cops banned me from taking further photos.  From the photos posted on the hotel’s website, it looks like a gorgeous place to rest your head as well as a place for dining and drinking.  The hotel was an Honorable Mention in Travel & Leisure’s Design Awards 2011 and is on Conde Naste Traveller’s Hot List 2011.  If you’re in the area, it’s definitely worth a visit.