Ladies Market, Hong Kong

An entire street devoted to all the craps in the world, especially fake stuff. Fake Gucci, fake Prada, fake LV, fake Rolex, fake Tag Heuer....you get the "fake" picture. Ladies Street was once famous for its stalls that sell erotic ladies lingerie but these days other stalls selling other items had been muscling in on its territories. Unlike Temple Street flea market though, there is no real food section here. But do look out for the stalls selling dildos on the fringe. Those tend to attract middle-aged men.

What to buy: Devoted to all things fake.
Boobs unfortunately, not included.

What to pay: BARGAIN IS THE ORDER OF THE DAY.

Most shopowners actually sell rather expensive items and of course, this is not unusual as they wanna make a living out on the tourists. However, if you want to get a better deal, the art is to bargain like my mom. At least, till you get a happy price. Some people said the prices which you bargain for should mark down at least 75%.

What to buy: Fake brands, bags, clothes, mobile accessories, shoes...Come on, it's ladies market!

1 more image

One of the busiest suburbs of Hong Kong is Mong Kok, where you will find Ladies Market.
Its an outdoor street market with loads and loads of stalls where you can buy anything from a Copy Rolex to Vegetable peeler.
Its got a wonderful atmosphere, and some of the stalls sell quite interesting stuff, and others just weird stuff, but interesting none the less.
Its a great place to go shopping for stuff to take home to friends and family. Some of the stalls also sell the usual souvenirs found in shops.

What to buy: As I mentioned you can buy anything, the most common things to obtain are copy merchandise. Ladies Market is also popular place to buy copy goods. For example, if you want to buy a copy watch you will see a stall with brochures on the table, if you page through the brocures, someone will normally some stand next to you to ask you what type of watch you want. They are normally up for negotiation if you are not happy with their price. Dont be afraid if they tell you to follow them to their "showroom". They just take you up a apartment block to where they keep their stock. Many different copy handbags are also a common purchase amongs tourists.
Other goods available are stuff like alarm clocks, sports bags, jeans, shirts etc.

What to pay: The stall owners are usually good sales people and will try their best to sell you a product. They are also happy to reduce prices if you bargain with them.
Many times the seller does not speak very good English, so when negotiating prices they will punch the amount into a calculator, let you have a look and then hand you the calculator so you can tell them what you are prepared to pay, very interesting actually!

You can find most of the famous cosmetics shops of Hong Kong on this street, such SaSa, Bonjour, Body Shop, and the Dragon pharmacy etc.

What to buy: skin care, body care, cosmetics

What to pay: credit card, but only cash in the Dragon pharmacy

When walking in the Mong Kok markets you will see lots of stalls selling fake Gucci, Burberry's, LV, etc.

Not all of them are good but some of them are absolutely very well faked and it is worth to give it a try.

You can bargain as much as you want and you are bound to walk out with a LV for 10 GBP :-)

My experience is specially good, and I have got very good memories of these little markets. My husband encouraged me to have a look at the LV's in one of the stalls (God bless him !!) and the owner showed me the LV catalogue and asked me what model exactly I wanted. As I could not decide myself the guy started to walk and asked us to follow him. We did, and he took us to a very dark alley with ended in another one even darker and smaller :-{ scary, eh....

Well, he took us to a flat and (now, have a look at my pic) what would you say of a flat without walls or doors, only shelves stacked up with all the LV, Gucci's, Burberry's in the word. You name it !! every brand and model.

YOu could choose whatever you fancied and later you had to bargain with the guy for the price you wanted to pay.

Lots of fun!! I got a Burberry's for a friend for the very reasonable price of 12 GBP and back in the UK no one could spot that it was a fake. NO ONE.
Well, my friend knew because I told her but the rest of her friends never knew the truth.

Only a word of advice.
The trade of fakes is illegal and it breaks the laws of the copyright. Get yourself a pair of items for personal use or pressies but don't get carried away unless you want the guys at customs to confiscate all your consignment :-)

Good luck

What to buy: Designer fakes. All brands and models.
Come on... treat yourself....

What to pay: You can bargain as much as you want. Really. some 10 or 15 pounds will get you a Burberry's or a small LV.
The big ones will be a bit more. Like 20 GBP or so. Still a good price.

2 more images

You cannot miss the Ladies' market. You just will see it !
It is a long street lined with all sort of stalls selling all you can imagine, clothes, shoes, souvenirs, bric-a-brac, even fruit four hungry shoppers !

All things looked a bit tacky for me, clothes and so on, except children's which I found very charming. But the atmosphere is quite Chinese. All people bumping into each other, and pushing and elbow-battling and... Uff, absolutely tiring... I was looking forward to get out of here, really.

Come to see it but pass it quite quickly before someone runs you over!

What to buy: Here, you can shop ladies' clothes (tacky)
Gents clothes (tacky too)
Babies/ children : you know, they look good in anything. I liked the chinese motif little clothes and the Hello Kitty pijamas and little T-shirts. V. cheap.
Little knick-knacks. V.v. cheap.

What to pay: Little. Everything is very reasonably priced.

Although the street is called "Ladies Market," there is so much to buy here that isn't just for the ladies. There is a huge assortment of everything you can imagine.

The ladies clothing and accessories are definately abundant. You can find all kinds of things like shoes, cardigan sets, cashmere scarves, pashmina scarves, hair accessories, designer knock-off handbags, designer knock-off watches, etc. There is so much that you can buy.

In addition to the ladies' items, there is a wide variety of men's clothing, other shoes, stationary, Sanrio items, children's toys, souveniers, etc. You name it and you might just find it here.

There is, however, repetition of the goods offered...so take your time and evaluate carefully. You can bargain with the vendors and get them to lower the price. This is especially true if you are looking to buy in large quantities. They definately will bargain with you then!!

What to buy: I love to buy the sparkling hair accessories. Even if you have short hair, there are some really cute ones for you. They are a bargain considering you can pay up to 7-10 times more than the price in Hong Kong here in the United States. Also, the scarves are nice. Beware that some are not cashmere or pashmina and are being passed off as such. I would generally stay away from the ones that have the label glued on as opposed to being sewn on, that is a good sign that its not authentic. However, they do have some nice ones made of rayon if you aren't picky about the fabric.

What to pay: HK$9 - HK$15 for hair accessories
HK$40 for rayon scarves
HK$100 for cashmere or pashmina...but caveat emptor

If you want to buy a knock-off purse that looks 99% like the original, Ladies Market is the right place to be. However, the trick is that these bags cannot be sold by the vendors on the street. The ones that you see on the stands are the ones that say "Cucci" or "Prado" and they are obvious knock-offs. Since they can't have these in the stores, you have to look through a catalog on table and tell them what you want. If you are lucky, they will invite you "upstairs" and you will be in a huge apartment with walls of luxury purses, wallets, and belts. It might feel a little shady going upstairs with a stranger, so make sure you bring friends with you. What you can also do is request they bring things down, but that takes awhile and you don't get to see the entire selection of goods. (and it's definitely worth it to see everything together)

What to buy: What you need to buy are 99% authentic handbags that comes with the bag protector and are lined and zipped just like the original. The prada bag that I bought had actual Prada lining and the word Prada on fine details. I bought my friend a LV mini handbag in the classic print and we took the bag into an LV store later on... I couldn't tell the difference!

What to pay: Bargaining and paying with US dollars is the key. I bought about 8 items for $100 US Cash and that includes purses from Gucci, Burberry, and LV.