Spring into vintage era

Visitors to the flea market find vintage desk lamps, thermoses, accessories and various toys from the '60s to '80s. Provided to China Daily

Spring is coming along with not only more sunny days but also weekend markets around the town - a good time for shoppers who wish to find something different from what supermarkets may offer.

At Dreams Factory Nostalgic Flea Market at the basement floor of Xintiandi Style, shoppers may find affordable toys, clothing, accessories priced from 5 yuan (80 cents) to high-end haute couture jewelry with a price tag bearing six digits.

"It's amazing here - I feel like I'm falling into my grandmother's wardrobe at one stall and revisiting kindergarten at another," says Liu Baochan, a 27-year-old office clerk. "Look at this toy piano - it could have been a luxury for girls when I was a kid - and you rarely find them in department stores nowadays." And the piano still works.

Here you'll also find desk lamps from the 1980s, thermoses from the 1970s, vintage bicycles, hobby horses and music boxes that appeared in 1960s movies.

According to the stall owners, they gathered the goods from all over the world to avoid the waste of beautiful things.

At Yo-xi, a stall selling steampunk jewelry with components dismantled from broken watches, buyers gather in front of the display desks to guess at how the designer transformed a pocket watch into a pair of cufflinks.

Wang Xing, a Yo-xi stall owner, says it is quite interesting to interact with buyers because they are inspiring, and original works may fill in the gap between people's imaginations and items offered in shopping malls.