Breaking out of the hutong

When people look back at the history of Nanluoguxiang, they will probably view the period from 2003 to the Beijing Olympics in 2008 as its rebirth. The alley, now anchored as a perennial Beijing favorite, was then witness to the hustle and bustle of young entrepreneurs, in quest of fame and success, wanting to showcase things made outside of a factory in Shenzhen.

However, this era of exploration saw an inevitable decline when pirate landlords swooped in, raising rents and causing many mainstays to ship out in order to make way for the East Asia generic bubble-iced tea trading company.

Old guard

Still flying the artistic flag today are two design stores that have made their names synonymous with Beijing. Plastered T-shirts, along with its creative dictator, Dominic Johnson-Hill, who has been steadily getting Beijing and various other parts of the country heavily plastered. And NLGX, who went from rooftop café to hutong crusaders and biker buddies, thanks to co-founders Ed Hung and Michel Sutyadi.

In January, both stores took their humble Nanluoguxiang beginnings to the next level by branching out in very different ways. Plastered T-shirts, while already a presence in Shanghai, opened a new branch in the 798 Art Zone. NLGX branched out to Beijing Capital Airport, pitting themselves against luxury brands and discount duty frees.

"I went into this from a creative angle, I wanted to create images and artwork and plaster them on t-shirts," says Hill. "I always wanted to keep Plastered a small giant, not a franchised soulless business model."

The 798 store has stuck much to the same theme of iconic Beijing designs, tweaked by historical and local influences of the area, mosaic patterns and old communist imagery. However, they did have to take down the Mao Zedong stained glass window, following the advice of the local government.

"I have a passion for generating artwork. 798 gives me an opportunity to generate artwork that might end up on T-shirts, but might also just end up as part of my collection and also give people an opportunity to buy that artwork at affordable prices," he says, quickly clarifying, "not 798 prices, affordable prices."