INFAMOUS
CHINA

Day 1 — Arrival in Shanghai

Land in Shanghai at your convenience. China's financial and cultural powerhouse is well connected with flights from across the world. Those arriving early meet at 3pm in the hotel lobby to visit a legendary Shanghai tailor and be measured for an optional bespoke suit, then head out for dinner and a first taste of the city after dark.

Overnight: Shanghai

Day 2 — Shanghai

Pre-tour briefing at 8:00am, then a stroll down Nanjing Road, Shanghai's most iconic shopping boulevard and the best introduction to the city's pace and spectacle. It runs east to the Bund, where we stop for coffee on the waterfront and the Monument to the People's Heroes, raised to the PLA martyrs who died taking the city. The afternoon is a food-focused walk through the French Concession: a serious spread of classic Shanghainese dishes across a string of unassuming local spots, with native guides explaining every plate.

Overnight: Shanghai

Day 3 — Shanghai → Hangzhou

High-speed rail to Hangzhou, famous across China for its natural beauty and slower pace of life. The afternoon is at the natural disaster simulation centre that has gone viral across China: typhoon-force winds, torrential rain, flash flooding and an escape from a flooding car park, all run under instruction. Dinner is out in Tianducheng, China's "fake Paris", under a 108m replica of the Eiffel Tower.

Overnight: Hangzhou

Day 4 — Hangzhou → Suzhou

A morning on West Lake with its causeways, pagodas and willow-lined shores, then Yue Fei Temple on the northern shore, dedicated to one of China's most enduringly patriotic figures, and lunch in the old town. Afternoon rail at 300kph to Suzhou, the scholarly capital of Chinese civilisation from the Song to the Qing and a canal city often called China's Venice, arriving in time for dinner and a free evening among the waterways.

Overnight: Suzhou

Day 5 — Suzhou

The Humble Administrator's Garden, a UNESCO World Heritage site and the masterpiece of Chinese classical garden design, named for a Jin dynasty scholar-official's wish to retire from politics into tranquility. In the afternoon, Zhouzhuang Water Town: stone bridges, narrow lanes and waterside homes.

Overnight: Suzhou

Day 6 — Suzhou → Shanghai

Back to Shanghai by high-speed rail and into our hotel in the French Concession. The Propaganda Poster Art Museum holds the most complete collection of its kind in the world: a candid look at how imagery shaped politics and daily life in modern China, with original relics available to buy. As evening arrives, a drink on the Bund with the Pudong skyline opposite.

Overnight: Shanghai

Day 7 — Shanghai

A treasure hunt at Yangpu antiques market: memorabilia, documents, oddities and live insects, traditionally kept as pets in the Confucian scholarly tradition. Your guides help you haggle. As it gets dark we head up to a rooftop party over the Bund, the Pudong skyline lit up across the water, then down into the French Concession for a night out for the ages: small restaurants, hidden bars and lively clubs, and the reason Shanghai was once called the Pearl of the East.

Overnight: Shanghai

Day 8 — Departure

Any tailored suits are delivered with a final fitting and adjustments if needed, with time for last-minute exploring, shopping, or a coffee before departures. End of trip.

*This itinerary is a guide rather than a fixed schedule. Timings, running order and individual stops may be adjusted to suit the group's pace and guests' preferences, or to fold in additional experiences worth having while we're on the ground.

The Route