Puerto Vallarta Shopping

Great Markets Around Vallarta: Colorful and chaotic, the market, also known as el tianguis, is one of the most important shopping venues in Mexico, as in many parts of the world. Whether you need hair ribbons or a lethal machete, an embroidered tablecloth or a set of tires, a live chicken or the pot to cook it in – it’s likely to be at a local tianguis.

Best New Supermarket: Mega Cormercial Nuevo Vallarta, Nayarit: Now North Shore residents and visitors have a new reason to look forward to shopping for their groceries. Thanks to the recently opened Mega Comercial Nuevo Vallarta, located in Bucerias’ outskirts, they don’t have to drive all the way to Puerto Vallarta. The spacious store is an open invitation to wander around with your cart and enjoy a broad variety of offerings in the usual departments. An ample selection of wine and liquors is noteworthy.

Best Way to Blow Your Diet: Paris Café Pâtisserie: In the dictionary, “temptation” is a 10-letter word, but at the Paris Café Pâtisserie it is only six letters: p-a-s-t-r-y. Eric Lenoir, cafe owner and pastry chef, learned the art of pastry making as a youth, while baking at his mother’s side in Paris, France. He has worked worldwide, including being a chef in Las Vegas and Ecuador, and starring in his own TV cooking show in California.

Find It All Now!: Fashionable, stylish, chic, trendy, elegant, hip, smart and modish — not shoes or hairstyles, but everything required for your Vallarta home! From sofas to refrigerators, lighting to rugs, find it all — for indoors and out — just a short ride north of the airport in Las Juntas, along the highway to Tepic.

Best Use of Glass: Galeria EM: Intrigued by that funky little palapa-roofed building across from the entrance to Marina Vallarta? Well, you should see what’s going on inside! And you can, half-hour tours of this glass studio and showroom given in English or Spanish to those curious about the making of translucent magic from A to Z.

Best New Shopping Experience to Look Forward To: Liverpool: Red alert for all shopaholics! A new shopping center will open its doors in October, promising to be a menace to our credit cards but also a delight. One of Mexico’s most popular department stores, Liverpool, will feature two floors with more than 73,000 square feet of shopping space each.

Best Excuse to Sin: Xocodiva: New on the PV scene is yet another temptation. And we recommend you not pass up this one: delectable, handcrafted artisan chocolates. Made in a gleaming little South Side shop by Canadian chocolatiers Carole Fast and Charlotte Semple, these confections are mind bogglers, activating every pleasure center, bar none.

Best Baguette: Comercial Mexicana: Just above the bin of bolillos at Comercial Mexicana lie the baguettes, fragrant bayonets of bread with crispy crusts. At just $8 pesos each, this bread goes fast — especially on weekends because only 56 are baked each day in each of the two stores in Puerto Vallarta.

Turkeys are Red, Iguanas are Blue: To relieve their inevitable bouts of bucolic boredom, goatherds have from time immemorial moonlighted as unpaid whittlers of wood. But then around 50 years ago, the world of pro bono wood-whittling was changed forever when a Mixtec Indian named Manuel Jimenez began applying paint to his rustic carvings.

Home Decorating in Vallarta: For the upcoming issue of “Costa Vallarta Luxury Living,” one of the editorial assignments was decorating and furnishing a condominium in Punta Mita using only items from stores located in the Costa Vallarta area.

Traditional Jalisco Candies: A visit to Puerto Vallarta would not be sweet enough without these delicacies.

Behind the Scenes at a Talavera Factory: As you discover Puerto Vallarta, it is difficult to miss the ubiquitous oval-shaped ceramic door signs outside many of its buildings, or the square hand-painted tiles that adorn their different rooms, or the ornate plant holders, picture frames, plates, mugs and even bathroom sinks available for sale in many of our gift shops.

Public Art an Appealing Peninsula Feature: Happily, the folks behind the Peninsula residential and commercial development share the vision of Puerto Vallarta as a thriving art destination, incorporating colorful fresh pieces into their exciting new shopping center.

And Such a Bargain!: Haggling over price is generally expected in Mexico, but keep in mind that to bargain is not to argue; rather, it is a courteous discussion of price. For a good deal, it’s not necessary to be aggressive or obnoxious, just knowledgeable and determined.