The French Concession was once home to the bulk of Shanghai's adventurers, revolutionaries, gangasters, prostitutes and writers, though ironically not many of them were French. Shanghai's nickname "Paris of the East" stems largely from the tree-lined avenues, Tudor mansions and French-influenced architecture of this district.
Today the area is still the most graceful part of Shanghai, and the most rewarding district for walks and bike rides. The area also hosts the lion's share of Shanghai's nightlife, restaurants and shopping. The central traffic artery is Huaihai Lu, named after a decisive battle that ended with the communists routing the Kuomintang during the Civil War.
Art Scene China
Contemporary Chinese art is exhibited in this lovely restored 1930s villa. The previously website-based gallery represents 25 artists whose work ranges from pop art to modern and surreal, plus some inventive reinterpretations of Chinese calligraphy. The gallery is hidden down a quiet alley.
Fuxing Park
Laid out by the French in 1909, this lovely, leafy park is a European antidote to Shanghai's brood of synthetic parks. Revamping was underway at the time of writing, but there's always much to see, whether it be slow-motion taichi types or people walking backwards or chess players hunched over their boards in the shade of towering trees.
Madame Mao's Dowry
A small gallery that has wide-ranging exhibitions, with a focus on ceramics and Chinese furniture. Check local press to see what's showing.
Museum of Public Security
Not quite as dull as it sounds, this museum holds a few gems among the inevitable displays on traffic control. Look out for the gold pistols of Sun Yatsen and 1930s gangster Huang Jinrong amid the fine collection of Al Capone-styly machine and pen guns, as well as a collection of hand-painted business cards once used by the city's top prostitutes.
Site of the 1st national congress of the CCP
On 23 July 1921 the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was founded in this French Concession building, propelling this unassuming shikumen block into one of Chinese communism's holiest shrines.
There is plenty of Marxist spin in the museum commentary, just in case you had forgotten that Shanghai is actually part of the world's largest communist country. There's not all that much to see here, but historians will appreciate the site as a defining moment in modern Chinese history.
The first hall paints a fine picture of the foreign settlements before becoming mired in some dull exhibits of early anti-imperial rebellions. The second hall profiles the founders of the CCP and exhibits early translations of Soviet manifestos. The second building shows the room where the whole Party started, actually the house of one of the delegates, Li Hanjun.
Of the 13 original delegates, only two (one was Mao Zedong) ever worked in the Chinese government. Five were killed before the communists took power and another six either quit the Party or were expelled as traitors.
You must buy your ticket at the northwest corner of the building but enter from the southeast. Marxist stamp collectors will want to peruse the souvenir shop for its complete collection of communist leaders.
Song Qingling's Former Residence
Built in the 1920s by a Greek shipping magnate, this building became home to the wife of Dr Sun Yatsen from 1948 to 1963. Like most former residences the exhibits can be dull unless you are an admirer of Song or of old houses, but the garden of camphor trees is particularly nice. Highlights include the sitting room where Song met Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai and the writer Guo Moruo, the dining room where she had dinner with Kim II-sung, and the Soviet limousine presented to her by Stalin.
