“I love everything” about Thuong Xa Dong Khanh fabric market, says the Watchful Wanderer. “The stalls are piled to the roof with bolts of different coloured fabric in all sorts of styles and patterns and you have to squeeze your way down the narrow aisles, often pressing yourself into the fabric just to let a worker pass.” The sequin stall is stocked with “gorgeous piles of fabric in every colour of the rainbow with shiny bits glinting invitingly in the sun contrasted with the dirty, trash filled street, the motorbikes cruising by and hundreds of power lines crisscrossing dangerously above the market.” Thuong Xa is actually a wholesale market, where the stall owners speak almost no English -- “only calculator” -- and “the prices are cheap.”
Soai Kinh Lam Fabric Market is “jam packed” with over 500 large and small cloth stalls, notes The Culture Trip. “A special feature of the market is that each stall sells only one type of fabric but in different colours and textures, which will certainly make your browsing experience less overwhelming and more organised.” It’s a market where you can get any kind of cloth, “from spandex, chiffon, velvet, cotton, khaki to fabrics for curtains, sheets, cushions or tablecloths.” The bestselling items are satin, silk and brocade, the fabrics used for making ao dai, “the elegant national costume of Vietnam.”
An Đông Market is “the biggest fabric market in Ho Chi Minh City,” explains City Pass Guide. “You might have to search the different booths for a while, at least if your wish is rather eccentric, but usually you find what you need.” And although many fabric vendors sell at a fixed price, “if you buy a bulk amount, like for three shirts and two pairs of trousers, they are usually willing to give a discount.”