"I consider the tea house a kind of installation art. Now for me, art is about inspiring and touching people's hearts. The tea house is four dimensional, apart from the usual three dimensions, time serves as a fourth dimension. With our interior decorations we take people on a journey through time. Now to one side, are items from the times past, while on the other side we have the present outside the window below us. It is quite inspiring. And people have had wonderful experiences here. Many of them have expressed this in the notes from visitors," says Zhang Jianming, owner of Old Shanghai Teahouse.

Some of the interesting items include typewriters and refrigerators used in the 1940s. Shanghai was already a very modern city back then, as seen in posters of film stars and this painting of a famous swimmer.

Old Shanghai snacks are also featured here. Visitors can choose from a great variety of snacks including spicy noodles, veggie stuffed wontons, rice dumplings and Shanghai-styled steamed buns.

"We want to present a comprehensive experience for our visitors and we pay great attention to our food. They are made strictly using traditional procedures and there are no artificial flavourings. That's why many people from overseas also really love to come here," Zhang says.

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