Sheung Wan

Hong Kong's creative heart is heading west. Sheung Wan is only a 10-minute walk from Central along Hollywood Road, Hong Kong's unofficial antiques district, along a gravelly grid of steep lanes, past Chinese herbalists, coffin shops and impromptu bric-a-brac markets. The neighbourhood found new life a little more than two years ago when a crop of restaurants, galleries and nightlife spots started moving in."Sheung Wan used to be the sleepy vintage area," says Alan Po, the co-owner of the Press Room Group, which opened the Press Room restaurant here in 2006; the group has since become known for its knack in district reinvention. "People thought we were crazy opening a restaurant on the far side of Hollywood Road. UGG Classic Short But we liked Sheung Wan because it still had a sense of neighbourhood and was without prohibitive rental fees. It's like the 'anti' of shopping malls."It's a Thursday afternoon and Po and I are having lunch at the Press Room, a tiled brasserie with French cottage chairs and a wall stacked with organic and biodynamic wines from artisanal and little-known producers in France. Every table is packed with diners grazing on French-inspired dishes: lobster benedict, steamed mussels Provencal, peppered-beef salad with watercress and parmesan, matched with a long list of wines by the glass.Next door, the Press Group's Classified cafe is also full, with many lunchers spilling outside onto the footpath. It has a French cafe theme, with marble tabletops and hand-painted tile floors, and is best known for serving artisanal cheeses and hams that have been matured at the in-house affinage facility.Sheung Wan's foodie buzz is coming from Yardbird, a no-reservations neck-to-feet chicken restaurant run by former Zuma chef Matt Abergel. The queues are long - be prepared to wait at least an hour - but the charcoal-cooked bird is flawless and goes down a treat with the diner's signature cocktails."When I first moved [to Sheung Wan] there was just traditional business," says Grace Ching, the owner of Loveramics, a boutique selling exquisite handcrafted crockery by Hong Kong designers."Ours was the first boutique. Now there are loads of boutiques, galleries and cafes."Loveramics shares the steep one-way lane of Tung Street with a range of specialised boutiques. UGG Classic Cardy 5819 Opposite, Ellerman is a smart space selling freshly cut sunflowers, cushion covers, notebooks and country-style ceramics by the Amsterdam-based Pip Studio. A few doors away, Identity Art Gallery showcases "visionary art identities", such as those in the current exhibition by Hong Kong-born photographer Kurt Tong. Queen, the Chairman and I includes a series of photographs tracing Tong's family's journey through colonialism, communism and into modern China.Two lanes further west, on both sides of the street Sin Sin Fine Art has galleries featuring artists from China's burgeoning contemporary art scene.On Hollywood Road, the Space is a former meat-packing warehouse transformed into a slick, state-of-the-art multi-function space used for exhibitions, parties and pop-up shops. During my visit, the Space is exhibiting the meticulous but eerie sketches of Australian landscape artist Joshua Yeldham, who expresses his attachment to the NSW Hawkesbury River and the owls that live in that area.