Port guide: Shanghai.

One of Shanghai’s nicknames is ‘the Paris of the East’, and just like the French capital it is carved in two by a waterway. The Huangpu River divides China’s great port city into east and west, new and old. In Pudong on the east bank, an LED symphony of illuminated skyscrapers represents the future – not just of this city but of China as a whole, which continues to follow the trail blazed by Shanghai during the rapid development of the 1990s. Immediately west of the Huangpu lies the architectural splendour of the city’s colonial past, when Shanghai was carved up by foreign powers during China’s ‘Century of Humiliation’ from the 1840s onwards. Grand edifices such as the old HSBC headquarters and Customs House line the waterfront, while the remnants of historic buildings and traditional shikumen dwellings – terraced homes that blend Eastern and Western styles – radiate out on the streets around them.

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