What to buy in Zhangjiajie? 15+ top Zhangjiajie souvenirs & best things to buy in zhangjiajie, China

Zhangjiajie is one of the famous tourist destinations in China. This place is blessed with diverse terrain of spectacular mountains, hills, sandstone, and plains. In addition, this place is also remembered for its rich local specialties, especially famous for its tea, pine mushrooms, and some handicrafts. If you travel to this beautiful land and don’t know what to buy in Zhangjiajie, check out our Zhangjiajie shopping guide with some suggestions below!

Compared to big cities, Zhangjiajie’s local shopping is not very developed, and not too diverse. However, as a destination with a beautiful natural environment, many special local products are produced here. Therefore, you should buy some local souvenirs for your family or friends when coming to Zhangjiajie.

Zhangjiajie – a famous tourist destination in China is located in the northwest of Hunan province. This place is blessed by nature with a majestic beauty of mountains and rivers that is unmatched. Most tourists when coming to Zhangjiajie cannot help but exclaim and admire the sky-high stone pillars, the towering steep cliffs with strange shapes and the rolling, fierce but heart-stoppingly beautiful waterfalls, blue ponds especially when autumns comes…

Tujia brocade (#What to buy in Zhangjiajie)

Tujia Brocade or Xilankapu has a history of appearing 2000 years ago. It was first sewn into costumes in the palaces of the Qin and Han dynasties.

Tujia brocade is a sophisticated product in the folk arts and crafts of the Tujia people. Thanks to its rich patterns, elegant and unique style, Tujia brocade is used to sew clothes and various daily necessities. When looking at a piece of Tujia brocade fabric, you will feel the simplicity but not lacking in freshness and joy, especially the ethnic features. At the same time, as an ancient folk art, Tujia brocade has a history of more than 2000 years. Its unique ethnic style and rich ethnic identity are a great souvenir for tourists.

Nowadays, Tujia brocade is mainly produced in the Tujia and Miao areas in western Hunan Province. It is a handicraft woven by the skillful hands of Tujia ethnic women, with eye-catching shapes, patterns and colors. With diverse religious cultures, the handicrafts of this ethnic group are unique and popular throughout mainland China.

Currently, Tujia brocade art is spreading in Zhangjiajie and Xiangxi Tujia and Miao Autonomous Prefecture (Western Hunan Province), and you can see these exquisite handicrafts on the main streets and back alleys. Moreover, it is one of the handicrafts that tourists must bring home when visiting Zhangjiajie. Designed according to practical needs, Tujia brocade can be made into wall hangings, tablecloths and clothes. All of these products are unique with a distinctive ethnic style and strong ethnic identity.

There are more than 200 types of Xilankapu, each with its own meaning. The brocade designs are abstract images of real-life objects with contrasting colors, all of which are highly decorative. In contrast to palace brocade, Tujia brocade is produced in the countryside and used by farmers. Therefore, it is imbued with strong folk culture that often provides insight into ancient Chinese totems.

The traditional patterns fall under three broad headings: natural images, geometric patterns, and language related to Tujia daily life. These include tiger stripes, leopard and deer spots, colorful golden pheasant feathers, clouds, waves and arches. There are also images of butterflies perched on peonies, a pair of phoenixes facing the sun, magpies singing on apricot branches, and a bridal procession to the groom’s house. Master craftsmen of Xilankapu can create designs without a template.

Ethnic jewelry

These are products handcrafted by the indigenous people of Zhangjiajie, so they have a sophisticated and unique beauty with eye-catching colors and patterns that cannot be found anywhere else.

Coming here, you can choose some products such as bracelets, jade pendants, necklaces, bracelets, rings or hairpins, … as gifts or simply souvenirs after the trip. Not only that, to make this item more unique and distinctive, visitors can ask the craftsmen to engrave their names on that item. This will definitely be a meaningful souvenir for every visitor.

Tujia Stickup Pictures

Tujia Stickup Picture is a unique handicraft of the Tujia people in Zhangjiajie. To create this exquisite painting, the artisans here have skillfully utilized and combined natural materials such as branches, leaves, bark and stones, etc. to create landscapes or people.

The theme of Tujia Stickup Picture often focuses on depicting the majestic images of nature and the simplicity of people (indigenous people). It is the embodiment of the rich ethnic culture and customs of the Tujia people.

To this day, the art of making Tujia Stickup Picture has obtained a national patent. With skillful hands and traditional techniques, the paintings with lifelike images have become “valuable” items that tourists cannot miss when coming to Zhangjiajie.

With unique manual techniques and excellent craftsmanship, the lifelike Tujia Stickup paintings have increasingly attracted the attention of domestic and foreign tourists.

Handicrafts

Because there are three ethnic minority groups in Zhangjiajie (Tujia, Bai and Miao), many beautiful handicrafts are produced here.

In addition, stone carving is a local handicraft in Tianzi Mountain Natural Resources Reserve. Guiwen stone is a fossil of an ancient life form, and craftsmen use it to create stone carvings in various shapes such as turtles, cattle, horses or dragons.

Laran is a traditional folk handicraft of the Tujia ethnic group in China. Batik is one of the three printing crafts in ancient China. Regardless of which village or village in Zhangjiajie, girls learn batik fabric from a young age. The skills are often passed down from generation to generation. In most villages in Zhangjiajie, each family has its own wax knife and dyeing vat.

For the Chinese people, handicrafts are the most special and valuable heritage of the ancient culture. If you are a lover of handicrafts, do not miss the embroidery paintings, elaborate and meticulous wood carvings, etc. made by the skillful hands of craftsmen in Zhangjiajie.

Folding fans (#Zhangjiajie shopping guide)

Paper fans for the elderly: grandparents, uncles. Paper fans are an item associated with Asians, especially loved to use in the summer. Until recently, with the popularity of air conditioners or electric fans, young people have gradually forgotten the convenience of this item. However, for the elderly, paper fans have a very important meaning: they help to remember the past, and are also a very special decoration in the house. Paper fans in Zhangjiajie are often made by artists with beautiful landscapes or mountains, which will surely please and cherish the recipient!

To create a finished product of a paper folding fan displayed in front of a stall is a meticulous, painstaking process of shaping by the hands of skilled people. The paper fans depict the beautiful mountains and rivers of Zhangjiajie in a realistic and strangely attractive way.

In addition, tourists coming here can also order custom-made paper fans painted according to their preferences and style. The fans are made of very durable paper, difficult to tear and fade, and the price is very cheap, affordable. So, don’t hesitate to “buy” a paper fan when you have the opportunity to travel to Zhangjiajie!

Eucommia Ulmoides Male Flower Tea

When mentioning Eucommia Ulmoides Male Flower Tea, people immediately think of Zhangjiajie and it is not an exaggeration to call this place the hometown of Eucommia ulmoides trees. This is a type of tea produced by a Chinese herb – Eucommia Ulmoides Oliv. Normally, drinking tea can help lose weight, control high blood pressure and improve low blood pressure…

Tourists coming to Zhangjiajie always buy Eucommia Ulmoides Male Flower Tea as a gift for relatives, friends and for themselves.

Rice Wine

Rice wine is one of the traditional culinary cultures of the Chinese people and is a source of great pride for them. The history of wine can be compared to the history of the founding of the country in Chinese society. And over that time, the origin of wine has gradually penetrated deeply into the lives of the people, as well as the historical stories of the Chinese people.

Chinese wine is divided into many different types depending on the cooking method, the brewing method, the amount of sugar, the type of yeast used for cooking… And the famous wine in this mountainous land is the wine stored in gourd and ceramic jars.

Wine is cooked from sorghum and distilled through many stages over a period of 6 months to produce the most flavorful and intense wine.

Maoyan raspberry tea

Raspberry tea is also one of the products that tourists love and buy as gifts when traveling to Zhangjiajie. As you know, the art of tea drinking has existed for a long time in China, this industrial plant is grown a lot in the major provinces of this country and Zhangjiajie is no exception.

Maoyan raspberry tea, whose Chinese transliteration is Mao yán méi chá, is one of the most famous teas in the mountainous city of Zhangjiajie. This type of tea is mainly distributed in the south of the Yangtze River basin, such as southeast Yunnan, Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Hunan and some other places.

Maoyan is not an ordinary tea, it is extracted from raspberries so it contains many ingredients that are good for health. The main ingredients of Maoyan raspberry tea are dihydromyricetin and flavonoids. Besides, they also contain about 17 types of amino acids such as leucine, isoleucine and methionine and 14 trace elements such as potassium, calcium, iron, zinc and selenium. The flavonoid content is about 9.31%, the highest of all the plants discovered so far, and it is also considered the “king of flavonoids” in plants.

Other teas: As a tea-producing area, Zhangjiajie boasts many famous tea brands such as: Qingyan Tea, Mingcui Tea and Longxia Tea. Around Zhangjiajie, there are also Yunwu Tea and Maofeng Tea from Tianzi Mountain and Maojian Tea from Suoxiyu Natural Resources Reserve.

Bacon

Tourists who have come to Zhangjiajie have almost all tried the local specialty bacon. Zhangjiajie bacon is made from venison – a famous meat product of the Zhangjiajie area.

The meat is marinated with many different ingredients and then marinated for half a month. With its delicious taste, healthy preparation method and reasonable price ranging from 50-55 yuan/portion, this product is increasingly chosen by people as a gift after a trip to China.

Zhangjiajie wild chestnut

Chestnut is a woody plant, belonging to the Ranunculaceae family, widely distributed in many scenic areas of Zhangjiajie. With favorable weather and environmental conditions, chestnuts have good conditions to grow and develop, making it the most popular tree in this area.

Chestnut flowers usually bloom in late spring, early summer, and flourish in autumn. After maturity, the outer shell opens naturally and the chestnuts fall to the ground. Local people will go into the forest to harvest and process them for sale to locals or tourists. Wild chestnuts contain a lot of starch and are very delicious. Visitors can buy fresh chestnuts as gifts or enjoy hot chestnuts right at the store.

Chinese Gooseberry

When coming to Zhangjiajie, you must try Chinese gooseberry (kiwi) because it is the best fruit in Zhangjiajie. Sangzhi County is the hometown of Chinese gooseberry.

There are many other fruits here such as Sweet Orange, Jinxiang grapefruit, Chinese chestnut and Hazelnut. You can buy these fruits in supermarkets.

Sweet potato noodles

Different from regular noodles made from rice flour, cassava flour, green bean flour, this special noodle is made from fresh sweet potato or sweet potato starch. Although today there are new methods of making vermicelli, saving more time and effort, many family vermicelli factories still do not change the manual method as a method to preserve the traditional profession. Sweet potato noodle, except for the flavor, the processing method is not much different from regular noodles.

Pueraria Mirifica Powder

Pueraria Mirifica is a powder made from fern roots that live in the forests of Zhangjiajie. This is a natural plant that can be used as medicine or food, very nutritious. It contains many trace elements such as soda, protein, Fe, Zn, Ca and many types of amino acids, so it is very good for human health. In addition, Pueraria Mirifica powder has the effect of purifying the body, cooling in the summer and good for the digestive tract.

When enjoying, you should mix the powder into hot water to dissolve the powder evenly, and finally it will have a very smooth and fragrant opaque white color. Therefore, visitors can completely buy it as a gift for relatives or use it as a daily food, which is also very good. There is a note when buying Pueraria Mirifica powder as a gift, you should buy it at the supermarket or some reputable places, because on the market there are many fake Pueraria Mirifica powders made from sweet potatoes.

Tips:

When you go shopping in Zhangjiajie, pay attention to what you buy. Make sure that any local products you buy are easy to carry and allowed on planes or trains.

Shier (Umbilicaria esculenta)

Umbilicaria esculenta, named Shier by Zhangjiajie locals. It is a species of lichen of the genus Umbilicaria that grows on rocks in the Zhangjiajie City area. It is edible when properly prepared and has been used as a source of food and medicine.

Shier is a treasure of food because it has the function of clearing heat and nourishing. And it is often cooked very well with meat or stewed chicken.

Important note: Patients with yang deficiency and spleen deficiency cannot use it.

Kudzu Powder

Kudzu Powder is a kind of Pueraria Powder, which is a starch obtained by grinding the roots of the wild legume Pueraria lobata Ohwi, also known as Kudzu that grows in China except Xinjiang and Tibet.

Kudzu is a deciduous perennial vine that grows up to 10m in length. The whole plant has yellowish-brown hairs. The root is cylindrical, thick, with a gray-yellow shell, powdery inside and very fibrous. The base of the stem is thick, the upper part is branched. It has many hard hairs. The seeds are oval, reddish brown and shiny. The flowering season is from April to August, the fruiting season is from August to October.

Pharmacological effects of Kudzu powder:

• Puerarin has the function of dilating coronary arteries and cerebral arteries, can lower blood pressure and significantly increase the blood supply to ischemic tissues.
• Contains more than 10 kinds of essential trace elements and 10 kinds of amino acids for the human body.

Where to buy in Zhangjiajie?

Recently, many shopping malls have been built in Zhangjiajie to improve the shopping experience for tourists. Here are some famous shopping places in Zhangjiajie:

Zhangjiajie Tianzijie

Tianzijie is a shopping district next to Wulingyuan Pedestrian Street. This road was formerly a bluestone road that was destroyed by floods. Tianzijie is now a famous shopping, entertainment, recreation, entertainment and dining center in Zhangjiajie.

Tianzijie is the first tourist-themed shopping mall. It is also the embodiment of Zhangjiajie’s central ethnic minority culture. With an area of ​​2000 square meters, Tianzijie is a combination of folk art and architecture. There are shops on the street; and shops in the garden. Every year, there will be many activities and programs from ethnic minorities taking place here.

Zhangjiajie Guanhe Shopping Center

Guanhe Shopping Center is located on Lingyuan North Road, Yongding District of Zhangjiajie, where shopping, dining and entertainment are concentrated. This shopping center is divided into two floors. The first floor deals in general merchandise, clothing, cosmetics, tourist goods, local products, handicrafts, watches, glasses, hats, shoes, clothing, cameras, development and printing, gold and silver jewelry and local flavors, etc. The second floor is a supermarket.

Guanhe Shopping Mall provides a large parking lot for shoppers, located next to the street. Guanhe Shopping Mall is the largest shopping mall and the largest tourist shopping mall in the north of Zhangjiajie.

Address: Lingyuan Road North, Yongding District, Zhangjiajie, Hunan, China

Meini Shopping Center

Meini is another famous shopping mall in Zhangjiajie. Meini Group has grown from a small roadside shop to a large chain group including two large supermarkets, four mid-range supermarkets and a cultural company in Zhangjiajie. Meini Group is a business wonder in Zhangjiajie. Meini Shopping Mall with its prime location and convenient transportation is not only a general market but also a modern supermarket.

From Meini Shopping Mall, you can buy daily necessities, food, wine, tea, local specialties, handicrafts, cosmetics, books, video and music products, clothes, bags and all kinds of household electrical appliances. If you are hungry, there is a rest room and snack room on the first floor.

Address: 15 Renmin Road, Zhangjiajie, Hunan, China

Zhangjiajie Department Store

Zhangjiajie Department Store is located in the bustling commercial district of the city. It is one of the main shopping places in Zhangjiajie. Zhangjiajie Department Store was built in 1982 and now covers an area of ​​8000 square meters. This department store consists of three floors.

Zhangjiajie Department Store has central air conditioning, escalators, fire alarm systems (automatic), cashier computer systems, TV display systems, etc. Zhangjiajie Department Store not only sells general merchandise, apparel, footwear, soft goods, gold bullion jewelry, hardware, TVs, household electrical appliances and telecommunications equipment, but also sells Zhangjiajie local specialty products such as bacon, wild mushrooms, tea, and ethnic minority handicrafts, etc.

Address: 11 Renmin Road, Zhangjiajie, Hunan, China.

Above are all the shares about what to buy in Zhangjiajie, best things to buy as gifts when traveling to Zhangjiajie as well as where to buy in Zhangjiajie. This place is increasingly affirming its position as a top tourist destination in China with many attractive destinations, providing great services and experiences for visitors. If you have the opportunity, come here to explore and choose for yourself some really special gifts!

The post is complied by Living Nomads from many different sources. If you find any images or text that belong to you, please contact us, so we can credit you or give us permission to use them. Thank you very much!

Some best day tours, trips, activities and transfer services, tickets in, from and to Zhangjiajie you can refer to

• Private Zhangjiajie National Park & Tianzi Mountain Day Tour
• Zhangjiajie National Forest Park Tickets
• Zhangjiajie Grand Canyon and Glass Bridge Tickets
• Zhangjiajie’s 72 Strange Towers
• Private Zhangjiajie Grand Canyon Glass Bridge and Baofeng Lake Day Tour
• Zhangjiajie 3-Day Tour (Cable Car+VIP Lift+Glass Bridge)
• Zhangjiajie: 2-Day Highlights Tour with Glass Bridge and Cable car

Read more China guide here.