Kansas City's premier shopping district (and the country's first suburban shopping center) is Country Club Plaza, centered around 47th Street and Ward Parkway (tel. 816/753-0100; www.countryclubplaza.com). Built in 1922 to resemble a Spanish marketplace, it's a tree-lined, 15-square-block area with more than 150 shops, restaurants, and nightspots. Crown Center, 2450 Grand Ave. (tel. 816/274-8444; www.crowncenter.com), is an 85-acre business and residential complex owned by the world's largest greeting-card company, Hallmark. It contains specialty shops, restaurants, hotels, theaters, and the free Hallmark Visitor Center (closed Sun-Mon), which chronicles 95 years of history with displays of Keepsake Ornaments and other Hallmark products and memorabilia, educational exhibits, and excerpts from Hallmark Hall of Fame television movies. Just northwest of Crown Center is the Crossroads Arts District (www.kccrossroads.org), where First Friday lures an artsy crowd to more than 60 galleries and shops the first Friday evening of every month.
City Market, at 5th and Main streets north of downtown and I-70 (tel. 816/842-1271; www.thecitymarket.org), is an outdoor market in operation since the 1850s. It's busiest on Saturday, when 150 vendors offer everything from vegetables and flowers to live chickens and T-shirts, but there are also permanent indoor specialty shops, international groceries, and restaurants occupying an Art Deco building. Cabela's, at the intersection of interstates 70 and 435 (tel. 913/328-0322; www.cabelas.com), is Kansas's top shopping attraction for its eye-popping wildlife displays and massive showrooms of outdoor equipment. It's located in a new leisure district west of Kansas City that includes the Kansas Speedway, Great Wolf Lodge, and The Legends at Village West, an outdoor shopping and entertainment center.
