By journalist Yin Su and correspondent Li Jing

On June 8, People’s Daily published a feature report focusing on how Xiangyang in Hubei Province has leveraged its ancient city resources to transform North Street into a national-level tourism and leisure district that combines residential living, sightseeing, culture, and commerce, driving a sustained upturn in consumption.

Xiangyang’s North Street stretches 1,270 meters, making it the longest traditional-style pedestrian street in China. It is now home to more than 700 businesses and holds the designation of both a national-level tourism and leisure district and a provincial-level featured commercial consumption zone. At the end of 2025, Xiangyang was selected as a pilot city for new forms, models, and scenarios of national consumption, known as “three-new.”

“In the past, tourists visiting the Ancient City of Xiangyang generated relatively low per-capita spending and visitors did not linger long,” said a head from the Xiangyang Bureau of Commerce (XYBC). “There was a flow of people—yet little consumption; rich cultural heritage—yet limited experiential engagement.” This disconnect once constituted the Ancient City of Xiangyang’s most critical weakness.

In recent years, this predicament has gradually been broken through with the opening of Guanjia Lane and the reopening of the renovated Prince Zhaoming Tower.

Technology Reshaping the Experience:

Visitors Are Staying Longer

Prince Zhaoming Tower, which underwent a total renovation investment of 95.3831 million yuan, is no longer a static heritage building. Its basement level now houses China’s first Three Kingdoms-themed mixed reality (MR) large-scale immersive space — “Encounter the Three Kingdoms: An XR Fantasy Journey” — deploying 4K high-definition MR headsets, 5G+ networking, and visual motion-capture technology so that visitors can experience classic scenes such as “The Three Visits to the Thatched Cottage” and “The Battle of Red Cliffs” firsthand.

“Before, telling the story of the Three Kingdoms relied on a tour guide’s introduction and books. Now it relies on computing power,” said the head of the operating company. The immersive experience has extended visitors’ average dwell time from 20 minutes to two hours, directly driving repeat spending.

Prince Zhaoming Tower is laid out on a “one floor and one theme” concept: the ground floor connects to North Street as a commercial and living space for the Ancient City of Xiangyang; the second and third floors house the core historical and cultural exhibition halls; the fourth floor restores the former site of the Northern Hubei Library, with Zhaoming Bookstore blending coffee, tea, and public reading; the fifth floor features Zhaoming Theater and the Lanfeng Opera Art Museum; the sixth floor serves as an observation platform known as the Ancient City of Xiangyang’s parlor; and the outdoor plaza hosts Xiangyang’s first holographic projection light show.

During the 2026 May Day Holiday, the Prince Zhaoming Tower–North Street commercial district welcomed 180,000 visitors and generated over 26 million yuan in consumption, effectively driving the linked operations of more than 700 businesses along North Street and forging a complete chain of “traffic attraction – extended stay – conversion – downstream spending.”

Integration of Business Formats:

Building a Full-Chain Consumption Loop

Guanjia Lane is an integral part of the Ancient City of Xiangyang. A thousand years ago, this old alley brimmed with the warmth of daily life and the fragrance of books. Today, it has been restored in a manner true to its original appearance. With a total floor area of approximately 13,500 square meters, it adopts a “four-dimension fusion” concept — integrating physical form, business format, cultural character, and ecological environment — and is divided into three functional zones: the Bustling Street, the Leisurely Lane, and the Tranquil Courtyard.

Unlike a conventional commercial street, Guanjia Lane has brought in a team from the Central Academy of Drama to create ten original productions with a distinctly Xiangyang flavor, including “Poetic Xiangyang” and “Chivalric Xiangyang.” The lane also features “historical NPC (non-player character) figures” — Zhuge Liang, Liu Bei, Guan Yu, Zhang Fei, Meng Haoran, Mi Fu, and others — who roam the streets and interact with visitors.

A head from the XYBC noted that the combination of Prince Zhaoming Tower’s “technological style,” Guanjia Lane’s “cultural refinement,” and North Street’s “vibrant everyday life” together constitutes the Ancient City of Xiangyang’s consumption ecosystem.

The North Street’s “Xiangcheng 8:30 PM” night-economy brand has continued to deepen its presence, with live performances, festival events, and late-night dining keeping the streets lively from dusk well into the night. Xiangyang beef noodles, brown sugar flatbreads, yellow rice wine taverns, and Shuanggou spicy soup have all become “consumption magnets” with their own built-in followings.

The owner of a yellow rice wine tavern on North Street shared his experience: “In previous years, January was the slow season, but now, thanks to immersive performances and evening tours, we receive an average of over 1,000 visitors per day. Not only have wine sales improved, but sales of cultural and creative souvenirs have also doubled.”

From a standalone pedestrian street with traditional-style architecture, North Street has evolved into a full-chain consumption loop combining “technology experiences + cultural performances + specialty dining + leisure shopping” — and this is precisely the new model of ancient-city commerce-culture-tourism integration that People’s Daily chose to highlight.

Institutional Innovation as Safeguard:

The Government Sets the Stage, and the Market Performs

As a national pilot for the “three new” consumption initiatives, Xiangyang has made bold explorations in institutional innovation.

To address the tension between heritage preservation and commercial development, the Ancient City of Xiangyang has established a new model of “heritage protection and market-oriented operations”: strictly adhering to the principle of “restoring old as old,” funds have been invested to renovate Prince Zhaoming Tower, Tongdi Square, and other heritage-listed sites; simultaneously, professional commercial management teams have been brought in to plan the business mix in a unified manner, phase out low-end and homogeneous shops, and introduce new formats such as intangible cultural heritage workshops, immersive theaters, and national-trend new retail.

“The Xiangyang Municipal Implementation Plan for Piloting New Forms, Models, and Scenarios of Consumption” has been issued and put into effect. Currently, Xiangyang has established a “three new” project reserve pool covering 93 projects with a total investment of 5.615 billion yuan, and the first batch of 28 projects in the pool are accelerating toward implementation.

“We are not just after momentary excitement — we want a sustainable ecosystem,” revealed a head from the XYBC. Leveraging the pilot policies, in the future, Xiangyang may establish an ancient-city consumer big-data platform to analyze visitor profiles and consumption preferences and dynamically adjust its supply strategies accordingly.

The cries of roasting chestnuts, the gasps of wonder inside the MR experience hall, the drumbeats from the stage in Guanjia Lane — the warmth of everyday life in the Ancient City of Xiangyang is becoming the most vivid testament to its consumption vitality.

What People’s Daily has seen is not only the thriving North Street, but also Xiangyang’s practical efforts to revitalize cultural assets and bring physical spaces to life — efforts aimed at genuine consumption stimulus.

Only through such endeavors can a thousand-year-old ancient city truly achieve a revaluation and regeneration of its worth amid the warmth of everyday human life.

The picture shows residents and visitors exploring the traditional-style market on North Street. (Photo by Yang Dong)