China‘s seemingly unquenchable thirst for wine has ousted America as Bordeaux’s number one client outside Europe, latest figures showed Friday.

With overall exports down a large 23 percent in 2009, vintners are now looking to the East to drain their cellars.

“China has become our first client outside the European Union,” said Alain Vironneau, president of the CIVB, Bordeaux’s wine trade body, in a press conference, hailing both Hong Kong and China as “dynamic”.

China’s buying power comes at a particularly opportune moment as France’s leading wine region struggles to survive the economic crisis.

Shanghai Tang is the first luxury brand from China with a mission to revitalize Chinese sartorial heritage by combining Shanghainese tailoring traditions with innovative modern shapes that are easily wearable in the urban landscape today.

China’s ever-growing taste for luxury goods is extending into the culinary world — and that’s good news for Jean-Marie Vallier, who runs a duck farm and foie gras factory outside Beijing.

Two years ago, French group Euralis — the world leader in foie gras production — invested 2.7 million dollars in the facilities, aimed at producing the delicacy for high-end restaurants under the Rougie brand.

As the tastes and budgets of China’s growing middle class expand, so does the demand for upmarket Western fare served in chic venues, and Vallier is well-placed to profit from the fledgling gourmet revolution.

The 4,000th Murcielago was recently completed at the Sant’Agata Bolognese factory where Lamborghini celebrated the occasion.

Lamborghini only made 2,900 models of the previous V12 model, the Diablo, over eleven years of production.

The lightweight 670-hp Lamborghini Murcielago LP 670-4 SuperVeloce, carrying series number 4,000, will be delivered to the company’s showroom in Hangzhou.

Wang Jing was all smiles as she strolled out of a Cartier boutique in Singapore after blowing close to 5,000 US dollars on a watch and a ring.

“It’s something I have always wanted, and besides, the economy isn’t looking too bad at the moment,” the Chinese tourist in her early 30s, in Singapore for a four-day spree, said.

“There’s no reason for me to hold back,” she said with a laugh that is music to the ears of the global luxury goods industry.

From diamonds to designer tea, high-end retailers battered by financial turmoil in the United States, Europe and Japan are now looking to China, India and other developing Asian nations for salvation.

The Chinese Government has started to roll out plans to turn the southern island of Hainan into what is being called a “global destination” and the private sector has been quick to rally to the cause.

New resorts, visa-free entry to tourists from more countries, duty-free shopping for everyone and the possibility of more sports-betting “lotteries” to increase revenue flow have been touted by the government as ways to lure the world to a destination commonly referred to as the “Hawaii of China.”