Canada's insider blog

In mid-October, Vancouver’s Chinatown was added to the roster of National Historic Sites (NHS) of Canada. One of Canada’s oldest and biggest Chinatowns, it’s a colourful neighbourhood adjoining downtown with streets lined in exotic architecture where you can hear the sounds of mah-jong and Chinese music, smell the Asian aroma of tea shops, noodle stalls and fine restaurants, and browse bustling sidewalk food markets.

The NHS designation honours the rich mix of commercial, residential and cultural buildings, courtyards and alleys constructed before 1920. Twenty-four are listed on the Vancouver Heritage Register including Chinatown’s oldest building, which now houses a contemporary art collection.

In the 1980s the Dr. Sun Yat Sen Chinese Classical Garden added a peaceful walled retreat to Chinatown: with tile-roofed pagodas and koi ponds, it is the first full-sized classical Chinese garden ever built outside China. The adjacent Chinese Cultural Museum and Archives houses artifacts and exhibits including Ming Dynasty vases and Chinese calligraphy.

Chinatown is the centre of a thriving Asian community that really comes to life on summer weekend evenings with the Chinatown Night Market and during the annual August Chinatown Festival, a street party and open-air market. But the biggest celebration of the year is the Chinese New Year’s Parade when dragons and firecrackers, dancers and marching bands take to the streets.