I've suspected that prices for "silk comforters" at Shanghai's Pudong airport are lower than at "factories" and "museums" around town. I find Water Towns are least expensive, but not everyone can get out there. As others caution, quality of a particular comforter needs to be verified as silk and cotton stock can be mixed yet labeled as silk.

Below are the posted prices from "International Shop" between Pudong airport gates 18 and 19. Didn't try to negotiate. I don't have comparison data compiled yet.

Meters Grams RMB at 7.8=$1USD
1.5 x 2 2500 590 $76
1.8 x 2 1500 480 $62
1.8 x 2 2500 790 $101"cotton cover"
2 x 2.2 2000 580 $74
2 x 2.3 2000 690 $88
2 x 2.3 2500 790 $101"cotton cover"
2.2x 2.4 2500 700 $90 double checked
2.2x 2.4 3000 830 $106

Seems something may be out of line here so I'll check again and post if any of the above are incorrect.

There may still be a shop on 2nd floor of Shanghai Center (same loc as Ritz Carlton aka Portman) above HSBC that sells high quality, but expensive, silk duvet covers. Not pure silk as they said that's too slippery. I went the less costly route and had duvet cover and pillow shams custom made at the Fabric Market.

Thanks for this information. The custom-made cover route sounds like a good one. But, forgive me, is there a sure fire way to tell silk bolts from polyester? I think my eye is pretty good on fabrics but all this talk of fake this and fake that is scaring me a little...

Any recommendations for buying lengths of silk?

ttt

I visited China in 2006 and bought a silk quilt. Now, 10 years later, the filling is starting to clump and I'm trying to find one here in the US, with no luck. I bought mine at Sibo Silk, which was in Hangzhou, I believe. I don't recall what I paid for it, but I'm pretty sure it was a lot less than what they want to charge here in the US. Plus, this was also 100% including the outside, whereas most of the ones I'm finding have a cotton cover. I did buy a cotton duvet cover so I could wash that. I highly recommend buying one, but if you're going to be traveling around a lot, you should look into shipping it home. I had to lug mine on and off trains for two weeks and that was kind of a pain.

Additional info. It wouldn't fit in my suitcase, because of the way we were traveling, all I had was a carry on.