china toilets

With seemingly endless stories appearing online about shoddy electronics, blood-red rivers and food products that could put their consumer six feet under, China gets a bad rap sometimes. True, this writer may well have wandered into some of the most poorly kept public restrooms that he has ever seen during a brief stay in the country a few years ago, but there is also plenty of luxury to be enjoyed in China.

Even with my six-figure salary, though, I have a feeling I’d be politely turned away should I even come within 50 feet of the swanky restrooms in this particular Chinese department store.

Taken in the La Perle Shopping Centre in Guangzhou, China, these photos give us a sneak peek at how the other half lives. From the thousands of differently coloured tiles to the mosaic designs on the wall and private ‘refresh’ spaces, this restroom became the envy of thousands of Japanese shoppers today when the following photos appeared online.

▼ Step right in, ladies. Your private rest space awaits!

china toilets 2

▼ Clearly the person who took these photos was able to sneak past the guards…

china toilets 3

Rather than subject its genteel customers to the humiliation of having to answer the call of nature knowing that other patrons may well be able to hear every embarrassing sound, each of the store’s mirror-lined ‘rest rooms’ is actually a made up of a toilet room and a small powder room complete with vanity mirror and a stool to use while freshening up. Customers are free to spend as long as they like in their private rest room, safe in the knowledge that everyday riffraff like you and me are not permitted anywhere near the facilities.

Built in just one year, this 10,000-square metre complex of boutiques and restaurants is thought to have cost around 100 million US dollars to build, and attracts only China’s richest with stores like Louis Vuitton, Hermès, Dior, Fendi, Prada, Hugo Boss, Celine, Burberry, Givenchy, Polo Ralph Lauren and Versace. It is perhaps only natural, then, that the restrooms should be roughly half the size of my apartment here in Tokyo…

Source: Byoukan Sunday (Japanese)