4th Songjiang Coffee Golden Week opens — 'coffee + film + light' immersive cultural-tourism feast lights up Thames Town

Cool autumn breeze, aroma enduring. On September 30, the 4th Songjiang Coffee Golden Week, themed “Play Coffee Songjiang, Extraordinary Coffee Status,” officially opened in Shanghai Songjiang’s Thames Town. The event is guided by the Shanghai Songjiang District Economy Commission and the Fangsong Subdistrict Office of Songjiang District, hosted by Shanghai Songjiang New City Investment & Construction Group, organized by Shanghai Songjiang Cultural Tourism Development Co., Ltd. and Shanghai Rongguang Asset Management Co., Ltd., co-organized by Galaxy Internet TV Co., Ltd. and Beijing Huanwang Zhiping Technology Co., Ltd., and supported by the Shanghai Cultural & Creative Industry Promotion Association and the Songjiang District Commerce Association. Lasting five days until October 4, the event uses coffee as a tie and film as a carrier, digging deep into Thames Town’s distinctive film-cultural-tourism heritage, linking diverse experiences such as specialty markets, fun performances, and trendy interactions, gathering local character and new creativity to create an autumn cultural-tourism feast blending everyday warmth with poetry, equally suited to leisure and check-ins.

4th Songjiang Coffee Golden Week site

On the afternoon of September 30, the opening ceremony was held at Thames Town’s Creative Industry Source. Multiple Songjiang District leaders, together with representatives from relevant committees, bureaus, malls, and scenic spots, witnessed the grand launch of the 2026 4th Songjiang Coffee Golden Week.

4th Songjiang Coffee Golden Week opening ceremony

The opening ceremony simultaneously hosted several release and sharing sessions. Zhou Jiayi, activity promoter of the Songjiang District Economy Commission, took the stage to release the “Root of Shanghai” golden-autumn consumption-season activities and announce the “Root of Shanghai” golden-autumn coupon distribution plan. Through the synergy of “festival + activity + subsidy,” citizens and visitors can extend a single purchase in Songjiang into a complete micro-vacation experience. Subsequently, Shi Ying of Shanghai Songjiang Cultural Tourism Development Co., Ltd. detailed the distinctive gameplay, highlights, and benefits of this Coffee Golden Week.

The most “Songjiang-flavored” moment was the Songjiang specialty coffee tasting. Baristas on-site used soda brewed from Songjiang’s quality rice as the base to creatively craft a Songjiang specialty coffee. The fragrance of rice and coffee blended in one cup, echoing this Golden Week’s industrial narrative of “from field to workshop”—this cup holds Songjiang’s rice aroma, the workshop’s craftsmanship, and the city’s everyday warmth.

The launch segment pushed the atmosphere to a climax. Leaders held coffee pots and slowly poured; warm water flowed over the launch stage, mist gently spreading, and the theme “Play Coffee Songjiang, Extraordinary Coffee Status” emerged with the thin fog, officially declaring the event open.

4th Songjiang Coffee Golden Week officially launches

After three editions of refinement, the Songjiang Coffee Golden Week keeps empowering local coffee culture to take root, completing a transformation and upgrade through continuous innovation—step by step from initial exploration to bursting vitality—becoming a highly recognizable cultural-tourism IP of Songjiang. This edition is a concentrated presentation of Songjiang’s sustained deepening of the “coffee + cultural tourism” integration path, hoping that through five days of rich activities, more people will see Songjiang, walk into Songjiang, and fall for a modern new city steeped in coffee aroma.

Champion Brands and Local Boutiques Share the Stage — Enjoy Diverse Coffee Flavors

On the National Day’s first day, Thames Town began filling with crowds from 10 a.m. The boutique-coffee zone along the municipal square stretched street-side; the air mixed the caramel of dark roasts, the bright fruity acidity of Hierloom (Hiero), and the creamy sweetness of milk coffee—three distinct flavors weaving through the autumn sunshine, making people slow their steps.

Champion coffee brands

Champion-level brands such as 666 Coffee, Balloonist Coffee, Dream House, SIMPUR COFFEE, and BEAN ELEMENT all took their posts; lines formed at the stalls as baristas steadily rocked their wrists, latte-art patterns quickly appearing on cup surfaces.

Songjiang local boutique coffee brands

On the local side, Songjiang boutiques such as Yunjian YOU Pin, Wangli Coffee, Mings Coffee, Tiandi Lixin, Fanan Coffee, T.O Coffee, Tingpao Coffee, Y KING COFFEE, and Kasheng Coffee gathered together. Among them, Yunjian YOU Pin, as the local representative brand of “Root of Shanghai” Songjiang, cleverly fuses Songjiang’s scenery with coffee creativity—each cup tells the most authentic Songjiang story. Wangli Coffee, deeply rooted in the industry for years, amazed with professional roasting and boutique beans, showing the profound strength of Songjiang’s coffee industry chain from a single green bean to a cup of aroma.

Yunjian YOU Pin

Yunjian YOU Pin (Shanggen Yaji)

Wangli Coffee

Quality coffee forces from across the country converged here, offering visitors a layered, stylistically diverse coffee experience. A representative of the local exhibitors said this Golden Week provides a centralized showcase and exchange platform for Songjiang’s local coffee brands, hoping that through this window more people will recognize the hard power and unique charm of Songjiang’s coffee industry.

Songjiang local distinctive brands

The market also gathered Songjiang local distinctive brands such as Fubei Pet Food, Enbolu, and Laiyifen, covering diverse categories like specialty agricultural products, pet food, lifestyle goods, and casual snacks—all kinds of crafted products attracting many citizens and visitors to stop.

Beyond the dazzling market stalls, diverse coffee interactive experiences also spread across the venue. Champion baristas and roasters brought thematic talks, discussing coffee expertise and industry trends with the audience. The Creative Design Industry Source section also opened a coffee DIY workshop where people could hand-make coffee soap, coffee brooches, coffee micro-landscape bonsai, and coffee-bean floral frames—extending “a cup of coffee” into “a piece of autumn memory you can take away.”

“One Cup of Coffee, One Swing Challenge” themed experience

The “One Cup of Coffee, One Swing Challenge” themed experience also landed at the coffee festival—rich coffee aroma paired with elegant golf, unlocking a relaxed urban leisure way. The venue offered beginner-friendly putting experiences and fun internet-famous photo props, easily capturing atmospheric shots; professional coaches provided basic putting instruction, so even zero-experience visitors could pick it up easily.

Wandering the town full of coffee aroma, visitors immersively felt Songjiang’s vivid, diverse life aesthetics—also the distinctive experience this Golden Week wanted to bring to the public.

When the Town Becomes a Film Set — Film Workshops Turn Visitors from Audience into “Behind-the-Scenes Players”

If the coffee market satisfies visitors’ taste buds, then the activities at the Creative Design Industry Source bring immersive “sound” and “picture” experiences into the town.

Film dubbing performance show

Film Foley performance show

Shangmei Film lamao paper-cut craft demonstration

At the Foley show, Foley artists used everyday objects—bottles, paper scraps, plastic bags—to perform film sound effects like howling wind, snow, fight clashes, and fireworks, drawing gasps from visitors; many tried it themselves, experiencing the fun of sound-effect creation. At the film-dubbing show, visitors actively participated, picking up microphones to dub familiar film characters, fully indulging their acting itch. The Shanghai Animation Film Studio’s lamao paper-cut craft zone was crowded; visitors watched and joined the intangible-heritage experience, appreciating traditional craft up close. The three distinctive workshops each showed their strengths, letting visitors, while strolling the town, immersively enjoy the novel fun where behind-the-scenes film creation meets traditional intangible heritage.

“Chinese Animation School” Shangmei Film master class

Two film-cultural activities held concurrently at the Songjiang Art Museum extended the festival’s depth toward “industry verticality.” At the film-sharing session, senior industry insiders, themed “a cup of coffee chatting about the untold stories behind film stars,” shared with the audience the less-told side of the film industry; the “Chinese Animation School” Shangmei Film master class combined lectures and roundtables, inviting Shangmei Film animation producer Wang Anyi to talk about the inheritance and innovation of Chinese animation aesthetics. Film fans and parent-child families gained here not just a class, but an entry point to understand the film industry and Chinese aesthetics.

Through the town’s streets, four NPCs in costumes wandered, interacting closely with visitors and recreating classic film scenes. The Xiaoshidai Square set zone launched film co-branded specialties and non-alcoholic tipsy drinks, weaving film elements into a tip-of-the-tongue experience.

CCTV-6 Movie Channel limited cultural-creative stall

Yunting · Light-and-Shadow Sound Post Office

Meanwhile, the CCTV-6 Movie Channel limited cultural-creative market made a surprise appearance—The Snow Leopard and Her Friends series merch, Movie Channel × Han Meilin co-branded Horse-Year cups, and other collectible goods attracted crowds to stop and check in. The “Yunting · Light-and-Shadow Sound Post Office” launched by CNR’s Yunting let visitors, relying on the in-car audio scenario, record 30 seconds of sound and “seal” it into a sound-emitting postcard, sending the town’s coffee aroma and light-shadow soundscape to distant relatives and friends—a favored new check-in experience.

Pets Also Have Their Own “Coffee Status” — Human-Pet Quality Time on the Lake-Center Island

In the afternoon, Huating Lake shimmered; the central Ellen Island transformed into the softest puzzle piece of this autumn feast.

Ellen Island pet-friendly market

Dozens of tents spread across the island; the rich coffee aroma wove with the lawn’s grassy scent, occasionally mixed with a bit of pet-snack meatiness—this is the afternoon exclusive to the camping-coffee zone, also a city-level landing of a pet-friendly coffee scene. Here, “human-pet co-fun” is arranged into the same rhythm: the owner orders a pour-over and sits in a camping chair while the furry child frolics on the grass.

Pet party

“A cup of coffee’s time” became the most natural unit of this party. At the pet obstacle race, Corgis, Border Collies, Golden Retrievers, and Teddy successively leapt over hurdles, crawled through tunnels, and jumped through hoops; owners held coffee cups by the track cheering for their furry kids, the steam in their cups rising with the cheers. The pet-fashion T-stage show followed; dogs wagged tails through the full course while cats sat calmly in their owners’ arms accepting “inspection.”

Pet birthday check-in installation

To make this human-pet co-fun more ceremonial, the island was decorated with pet sign-in points, pet-birthday check-in installations, and photo banners—super many photogenic spots—letting every visiting guest leave an autumn memento of “one cup of coffee + one furry child.” A young couple with their dog said that usually, busy with work, walking the dog and drinking coffee are always “either-or”; rarely is there a place where they can both enjoy coffee and let the furry child play to its heart’s content—”it plays its part, I drink mine, and in the end we can take a photo together”; for them, this is the most healing memory of the holiday.

Day Coffee, Night Shadows, Light Never Ceases — Thames Town’s Twelve-Hour Narrative

As night fell, Thames Town’s splendor did not end, but was ignited in another way.

3D Mapping light-and-shadow show

The large and small island lawns turned into open-air cinemas, with classic films and artistic works screening in turn—starry sky as ceiling, lawn as seat; the evening breeze carrying the aftertaste of stories wove with the undissipated coffee aroma into a unique autumn-night memory. The municipal-square building exterior became a giant screen; the 3D Mapping light-and-shadow show unfolded a flowing visual scroll under the town’s night sky—light and shadow leaping, flowing, and recombining among the English-style street frames, letting static architecture tell a dynamic urban story.

Check-in installation

The night check-in installations were also popular photogenic spots. The “Life Highlight Red Carpet” gleamed under lights; spotlights lit up one by one, and each step onto the carpet felt like a high-point moment at an awards ceremony. The red phone booth glowed warm; its retro body contrasted charmingly with the English street scene—push the door and snap, and it’s a frame of film. Under the wishing tree, lights flickered gently, adding a romantic wish to the autumn night in the coffee aroma. The night scenes where light-shadow and installations intertwined let visitors’ lenses extend from day into night, becoming a unique memory of the town’s night tour.

Night market

The careful “day coffee, night shadows” choreography extends what was once daytime-only coffee consumption into an all-day cultural-tourism experience—opening the day’s market roam with a cup of coffee, then poetically closing the night with a light-and-shadow show. The consumption chain is lengthened, the city’s night economy activated, and visitors’ dwell time and emotional investment deepened. For Thames Town, this is not only a scene upgrade of a festival, but a “all-day cultural tourism” urban narrative written with coffee as the medium and light-shadow as the pen.

Carnaby New World · Silver-Hair sub-venue

In addition, this Golden Week also set a Silver-Hair sub-venue at Carnaby New World. On October 1, the Silver-Hair sub-venue’s music special opened lively; silver-haired performers sang red classics and nostalgic old songs with voice and saxophone, their spirited presence drawing rounds of applause. The activity uses the coffee-cultural-tourism scene to break age barriers, promotes intergenerational resonance through art, and showcases a colorful silver-hair life.

The 4th Songjiang Coffee Golden Week uses a small cup of coffee as a lever to pry open multiple possibilities of urban cultural tourism, industrial economy, and cultural life. It is both a window showing visitors from everywhere the diverse facets of Songjiang from historical context to contemporary life, and a bridge connecting local coffee craftsmen, film creators, cultural workers, and every ordinary citizen who walks into the town.

When coffee aroma meets light-and-shadow romance, when the refinement of Shanghai-style culture and the gentle warmth of Songjiang’s landscape blend, this five-day festival has long surpassed an ordinary market. What it presents is Songjiang’s land exploring self-expression between inheritance and innovation, and a warm, mellow regional name card “Humanistic Songjiang” extends to guests from all directions in the new-era context.

(Note: This article is commercial information published by CNR.com; the content does not represent the views of this site and is for reference only.)

Reprint notice: This article is reprinted and translated from CNR.com (commercial information). The original Chinese title is “4th Songjiang Coffee Golden Week opens: an immersive coffee-screen-light cultural-tourism feast lights up Thames Town”. English version compiled by coffeeyo.com for overseas readers. Copyright belongs to the original publisher.