Flower Market

Flower Market Road in Mong Kok is lined on both sides with florists and plant shops whose stock spills out across the pavement, so the street is walked between banks of orchids, lilies, cut branches, bonsai, succulents and imported blooms, with wholesalers loading vans at one end and retail customers picking stems at the other. It runs at its most intense in the weeks before Lunar New Year, when Hong Kong households buy peach blossom, kumquat trees, narcissus and chrysanthemum for luck and the street becomes almost impassable. At the eastern end the road runs into the Yuen Po Street bird garden, and the goldfish market is a few streets south.

What you actually see

• Pavements banked with flowers - shops spilling into the street.
• Lunar New Year plants - peach blossom, kumquat and narcissus in season.
• Wholesale loading at dawn - the trade side of the street.
• Orchids and bonsai - the specialist stock among the cut flowers.

When to go

January and February before Lunar New Year for the peak; year round otherwise, best in the morning. One hour. The New Year weeks are crowded to the point of gridlock.

Honest expectations

Outside the New Year period it is a working shopping street rather than a spectacle. Plants cannot be taken across borders without paperwork. Pavements are blocked with stock and difficult with a pushchair. Photographing inside shops without asking annoys the traders.

Nearby

The bird garden is at the eastern end; the goldfish market lies south.