A touch of glamour is returning to the Bund, the wide avenue with views across the Yangtze which used to be the city's main drag. In between the classical facades of the 1930s colonial mansions, some renovated by banks or by smart restaurants, the first Louis Vuitton store has opened. Coffee shops and boutiques are sprouting along the tree-lined streets with art deco apartment buildings that run behind the Bund.
It might sound a lot like Shanghai, the east coast metropolis with its own famous Bund whose revival has fired imaginations about China's economic boom – or more precisely, the Shanghai of 10 years ago. But it is actually Wuhan, one of the giant cities in the centre of China barely known outside the country – but which are beginning to develop their own thriving consumer classes.