Hong Kong & Shanghai

• Experience Art Basel in Hong Kong, the Asia Pacific’s premiere art fair, where leading galleries, artists and art lovers from around the world gather

• Get to the heart of contemporary Kowloon at M+, a long-awaited museum of visual culture, and visit the recently opened Hong Kong Palace Museum

• Visit Shanghai’s fantastic private museums, from the cultural treasures of the Aurora Museum

• Explore Shanghai’s growing arts district, with a visit to the new museums of a revitalised West Bund and the galleries and studios of M50

• Take a day trip to Suzhou, renowned for its UNESCO World Heritage-listed classical Chinese gardens

• Enjoy an extension tour to Hangzhou and Yellow Mountain, taking in archaeology from the ancient Yangtze Delta, historic water towns and the majesty of Yellow Mountain

THURSDAY 25 MARCH 2027 – ARRIVAL (CANAPES)
Flights from Australia arrive in Hong Kong in either the early morning or early evening. Transfers from the airport to the hotel are included for all participants. In the evening, we gather in the hotel lobby for welcome drinks and canapes and a chance get to know each other and talk about what we’re looking forward to seeing. First of four nights in Hong Kong.

FRIDAY 26 MARCH 2027 – ART BASEL & THE HONG KONG PALACE MUSEUM (B, D)
After a leisurely start, we travel by private coach to the Hong Kong Palace Museum in West Kowloon, which was designed by Hong Kong’s Roco Design and opened in 2022 to house exhibitions of cultural treasures from the Palace Museum in Beijing. After enjoying the modern museum’s excellent collection of historic art and artefacts, we have a break for lunch on the Kowloon foreshore before travelling to Causeway Bay for our first visit of Art Basel. The fair, first organised in 2013, quickly became a major event in the Asia-Pacific art scene, attracting over 150 major galleries from around the world, from international stalwarts to a very healthy representation of galleries and artists from the Asia Pacific. We begin with a structured tour of the Galleries section, followed by time to explore the exhibitions at leisure. Returning to the hotel, there is time to freshen up before we go to dinner together.

SATURDAY 27 MARCH 2027 – ART BASEL & M+ MUSEUM (B)
This morning, we visit M+ in Kowloon. The long-anticipated museum dedicated to contemporary art and modern visual culture, designed by Herzog & de Meuron and Farrells, finally opened its doors in 2021. Its collections are vast and diverse, encompassing visual arts, film, design and popular visual culture from the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. After time to enjoy its worldclass exhibitions and a break for lunch, we make a second visit to Art Basel, where we begin with the sections of the fair dedicated to the artists represented by younger galleries in the Asia-Pacific as well as sections of the fair dedicated to new media, including digital media and works that harness the potential of AI to further artists’ creative practice. In the early evening, we return to the hotel by private coach. Evening at leisure.

SUNDAY 28 MARCH 2027 – ART CENTRAL (B)
The success of Art Basel has also brought further attention to the fair that takes place next door: Art Central. Art Central was also founded by Tim Etchells and Sandy Angus (who founded Art HK which became Art Basel HK), along with Will Ramsay, to showcase emerging artists from the region and works that are more conceptually or politically challenging than what would typically be displayed at Art Basel. We visit the fair this morning, which is typically peaceful on a Sunday morning. The afternoon is at leisure to explore the exhibition independently, or to, in the company of your tour leader, visit contemporary exhibitions hosted in Central’s galleries and art institutions. The evening is at leisure. Final night in Hong Kong.

MONDAY 29 MARCH 2027 – HONG KONG ART MUSEUM; TO SHANGHAI (B, D)
After checking out of our hotel this morning, we visit Hong Kong Art Museum. While housed in a modern museum building on the Kowloon foreshore, the museum was founded in the 1960s to provide a space for Hong Kong’s burgeoning art scene. The museum continues to showcase the work of Hong Kong artists from across the twentieth century to the present. We then continue to the airport for a mid-afternoon flight to Shanghai. On arrival in Shanghai, we transfer to our hotel in central Shanghai, where there is time to settle in before we have dinner together. First of five nights in Shanghai.

TUESDAY 30 MARCH 2027 – SHANGHAI MUSEUMS 1 (B, L)
Shanghai has long been a commercial and financial centre and the Chinese-speaking world’s face to the outside world, and today the city retains its international feel. The city has grown extensively in the past 25 years, and urban redevelopment, including the creation ex nihilo of Pudong, has focused on creating a thoroughly modern metropolis. Alongside this development has been the establishment of numerous museums and art galleries, many of which are independent or private collections. We begin exploring these fabulous museums today at West Bund, a formerly industrial part of the city transformed into a peaceful arts precinct on the Huangpu River front. Here we will visit a selection of museums, including the excellent Long Museum, which houses internationally respected shows drawing on international works from one of China’s finest collections of modern and contemporary art. In the afternoon, after lunch together and a visit to either the Power Station of Art or the West Bund Museum, depending on their exhibition programs. In the later afternoon we visit M50, a former textiles mill, which has been transformed into studio spaces for artists and designers, numerous contemporary gallery spaces and small cafes and specialty makers. Returning to the hotel, the evening is at leisure.

WEDNESDAY 31 March 2027 – SUZHOU (B, L)
Today we visit historic Suzhou, a cultural centre and ‘canal city’ about 90 minutes by private coach from central Shanghai. Our visit to Suzhou includes its fine art museum, and two of the city’s UNESCO World Heritage-listed gardens, the Master of Nets Garden and the Humble Administrator’s Garden, both of which are among the best-preserved traditional Chinese Gardens. The latter is still frequented by art students studying traditional aesthetics from the garden’s plantings and rockeries, which themselves echo traditional landscape paintings. Returning to Shanghai, the evening is at leisure.

THURSDAY 01 APRIL 2027 – SHANGHAI MUSEUMS 2 (B)
We continue our visits to Shanghai’s excellent museums today, starting at the Rockbund Art Museum, an institution inside the historic Asiatic Society Building with the reputation of being at the forefront of contemporary art in the Asia-Pacific. We then break for an early lunch in the area – one of Shanghai’s most fashionable neighbourhoods, before visiting the Aurora Museum. This private collection, created unexpectedly by two magnates of office equipment and supplies, is housed in the magnificent golden Aurora Tower in Pudong, and showcases masterpieces of traditional and historic Chinese art, and many of its exquisite pieces are national treasures. In the mid-afternoon, we drive the short distance to the East Shanghai Museum in Pudong. This recently opened museum houses the incredible collections of the Shanghai Museum, including one of China’s finest collections of Bronze-age metallurgy, to excellent collections of traditional ink painting from Southern Song Dynasty to the arrival of Europeans in Shanghai in the nineteenth century. Returning to the hotel in the later afternoon, the evening is at leisure.

FRIDAY 02 APRIL 2027 – THE CHINA ART MUSEUM (B, D)
This morning we visit the China Art Museum, a stunning red crown-like structure that raises traditional wooden architectural elements to a new scale in steel. The building was created as the centrepiece of the Shanghai World Expo in 2010 and was subsequently converted into an art museum. Its vast spaces allow for the display of monumental modern sculpture, as well as more intimately scaled spaces for thematic exhibitions focused on different aspects of art in China from the nineteenth to twentieth centuries, a very transformative if tumultuous period. The afternoon is at leisure, before we meet in the evening for a farewell dinner at one of Shanghai’s fine restaurants. Final night in Shanghai.

SATURDAY 03 APRIL 2027 – DEPARTURE (B)
The tour concludes after breakfast in the hotel this morning. Transfers to Pudong or Hongqiao airport are included for all participants.

Further information about our extension tour to Hangzhou and Yellow Mountain can be found below. 

Harbour Grand Kowloon 5* Hong Kong, 4 nights

https://www.harbourgrand.com/kowloon/en/

A well-located and comfortable hotel on the Victoria Harbour waterfront. We have chosen rooms in the well-sized Standard category, at 24 sqm.

Radisson Blue New World 5* Shanghai, 5 nights

https://www.radissonhotels.com/en-us/hotels/radisson-blu-shanghai-new-world

The hotel is located in the heart of Shanghai’s downtown area, beside People’s Square and the Nanjing Road pedestrian area. We have selected Junior Suites for the duration of our stay

NB: hotels of a similar standard may be substituted.

• 9 nights’ accommodation in 5* hotels

• All breakfasts and 5 lunches or dinners, including drinks

• All ground transport, guided tours and entrance fees to sites as mentioned in the itinerary, and tipping

• One-way flight in Economy class from Hong Kong to Shanghai

• Expertise of an Australian tour leader throughout

• Assistance of an English-speaking national guide throughout

A $1,500pp deposit is required at the time of booking to hold your place on tour.

A second deposit of $2,000pp is due on 25 November 2026.

We will invoice you for final payment for the tour, due on 08 January 2027.

When you book on one of tours, we ask you to accept our terms and conditions. You can read our terms and conditions here.