Panjiayuan Antique Market: a Chinese painting shop

Panjiayuan Antique Market is China's largest collection of treasures. Here you will find calligraphy, paintings, jade works, bronze wares, porcelain, furniture, antiquarian books, folk jewelry, and other old items. All saturated with Chinese culture. Foreign and domestic visitors alike congregate here for a ‘treasure hunt' at weekends.

With a facade of grey walls, red window frames, and a pair of red lanterns hanging from the roof, a black plaque with several big golden Chinese characters greets you at the entrance. 

Apart from antique goods, Panjiayuan is also a platform of Chinese folk handicrafts: Hengshui snuff bottles, Jiangsu embroidery, Shandong shadow play, Jiangxi porcelain, Yunnan costumes, and artifacts of Tibetan Buddhism.

Vendors in the market are keen to trade with foreign visitors, sometimes to the point of getting a bit pushy. So be careful and don't hesitate to haggle with those vendors.

It is open from 8:30 am to 6:00 pm. On Saturdays and Sundays the market can receive up to seventy thousand customers, of which about a seventh are foreigner. Dignitaries like Hillary Rodham Clinton, and Maha Chakri Sirindhorn, the Thailand Princess, have visited this market. Climbing the Great Wall, tasting roast duck, visiting the Imperial Palace, and strolling in the Panjiayuan market have become "must-do" for international visitors.