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Keramika V Ungeltu
This little shop in a corner of the Týnský dvůr is a good place to look for both traditional Bohemian pottery and modern blue-and-white wares, as well as wooden toys and marionettes, with prices up to 25% lower than at many other outlets in Staré Město.
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Kiwi
This small specialist travel bookshop stocks a huge range of maps covering not only the Czech Republic but many other countries. It also has an extensive selection of Lonely Planet guidebooks.
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Klara Nademlýnská
While Nademlýnská's upmarket womens- and menswear is refined, elegant and beautifully tailored, she still clearly has a keen eye for the latest global trends, which keeps her collections fresh and vital. Original pieces here cost as much as top-end high-street clothes in Western Europe.
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Kubista
Even for fans of the cubist style, this museum shop feels slightly austere and intimidating. It's all so artfully arranged, you feel scared to touch anything. Still, if you're interested in further exploring cubist buildings in Prague its pocket-sized guides are invaluable.
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Manufaktura
There are several Manufaktura outlets across town, but this small branch right near Charles Bridge seems to keep its trim inventory especially enticing. You'll find great Czech wooden toys, beautiful-looking (if extremely chewy) honey gingerbread made from elaborate medieval moulds, and seasonal gifts like charming hand-painted Easter eggs. The branch up the hill at Nerudova 31 specialises in cosmetics.
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Mapis
Mapis is a specialist map shop with a wide selection of local, national and international maps, including hiking maps and city plans covering not just the city but the whole of the Czech Republic.
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Material
Material puts a modern twist on the Czech crystal industry, with its oversized contemporary vases, bowls and Dale Chihuly-like ornaments, candleholders, chandeliers and glasses. The firm boasts its 'drunken sailor' glass is spill-proof. Yet, despite well-spaced displays, it's a store where you immediately fear breaking something - and when you check the prices you realise you should!
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Modernista
This classy showcase of Czech cubism, Art Deco and similar design features covetable but reasonably priced ceramics, jewellery, posters, books and some furniture. Early-20th-century reproductions include cubist boxes (Pavel Janák), expressionist ashtrays (Vlastislav Hofman), wooden toys (Ladislav Sutnar) and Jindrich Halabala's iconic 1931 reclining armchair. Contemporary items like sperm-shaped teaspoons, and Škoda toy cars add humour.
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Moser
This exclusive Bohemian glassmaker was founded in Karlovy Vary in 1857 and is famous for its ornate designs - which here are housed in equally over-the-top, Gothic surrounds. For those preferring cleaner lines, one classic Moser design is Royal 9000, used in Prague Castle and UN headquarters in New York. Model 9009 ( Kč1500 apiece) is the ultimate old-fashioned champagne glass.
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Mothercare
If you're travelling with a baby or toddler, you'll find pretty much everything you need to meet their non-edible demands in this bright and modern babycare shop on the first floor of the Mýslbek mall - toys, clothes, accessories and all manner of other goods for mother and child.
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Nový Smíchov
Nový Smíchov is a vast shopping mall that occupies an area the size of several city blocks. It is an airy, well-designed space with lots of fashion boutiques and niche stores - for example you could check out Profimed, which has all the dental-care products you never knew you needed. There's a big computer store, a food court, a virtual games hall, a 12-screen multiplex cinema, and it also includes a huge and well-stocked Carrefour hypermarket (open to midnight).
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Palác Flóra
You could be anywhere in the capitalist world in this shiny, glittering shrine to consumerism. Slick cafés share floor space with girly emporia of tiny T-shirts, sparkly makeup and globalised brand names - Hilfiger, Sergio Tacchini, Nokia, Puma, Lacoste, Guess, Diesel, Apple; a branch of the Thai restaurant Orange Moon, an eight-screen multiplex and an IMAX cinema keep the crowds coming in the evenings.
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Palác Knih Neo Luxor
Slightly musty though it is, Central Europe's largest bookstore is worth a browse, particularly for the fine basement selection of fiction and non-fiction in English, German, French and Russian, including Czech authors in translation. Elsewhere, there's Internet access, a café and international newspapers.
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Pavla & Olga
Quirky-yet-fashionable clothes and hats are the handiwork of two sisters who originally were costume-designers in the film and TV industry. Past customers include photographer Helmut Newton, Britpop band Blur and Czech supermodel Tereza Maxová, although they probably didn't shop in this tiny store. There's a larger branch at No 30 Karolíny Světlé.
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Pivní Galerie
If you think that Czech beer begins and ends with Pilsner Urquell, a visit to the tasting room at Pivní Galerie (The Beer Gallery) will soon lift the scales from your eyes. Here you can sample and purchase a huge range of Bohemian and Moravian beers - more than 180 varieties from 34 different breweries - with expert advice from the owner, who speaks both English and Swedish.
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Pohádka
This store is sometimes beset by souvenir-hunting tour groups and it harbours matryoshky (Russian stacking dolls) - artefacts that have nothing to do with Prague, despite their annoying ubiquity. Surprisingly then, it's also a pretty good place to shop for genuine Czech toys, from cuddly Little Moles to marionettes, via costumed dolls, finger puppets, rocking horses, toy cars and more.
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Pražská Tržnice
Almost a suburb in itself, Prague's sprawling city market includes a large open-air area selling fresh fruit, vegetables and flowers, large covered halls housing supermarkets, electrical goods and car accessories, and dozens of stalls selling everything from cheap clothes to garden gnomes. In the eastern part of the market are several antiques warehouses, some of which look like they have emptied a baroque palace or two.
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Promod
French and other Continental readers, look away now; you'll be used to the delights this trendy young Gallic chain brings. However American, Asian, Australian, British and Latin American travellers find this Czech branch a boon. Its range of affordable, covetable, up-to-the-minute fashion and jewellery might also be disposable, but it's a nice change from H&M.
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Qubus
This small shop looks more enticing online than in reality, but Qubus, run by leading designers Maxim Velčoský and Jakob Berdych, is an important Czech firm well worth knowing about. If you're taken by the idea of ceramic matryoshky , cake-slice-shaped candleholders, wine glasses resembling throwaway plastic cups, liquid lights and Lomo cameras, nip in here.
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Rocking Horse Toy Shop
A cut above, this wonderful shop is palpably a labour of love for discerning owner Ivan Karhan, who's assembled high-quality wooden carved folk dolls (from leading regions like Krouňa, Přibram and Skašov), old 1950s wind-up steel tractors, toy cars and even a few rocking horses. The famous and ubiquitous Little Mole character is here in several guises, but this small store also stocks toys and art supplies you won't find elsewhere in the city.
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Shakespeare & Sons
Though it stocks plenty of English novels, 'Shakes' is more than a bookshop - it's a congenial literary hangout, with a café (open till ) that regularly hosts poetry readings, author events and live jazz, and where you can settle down for a read over coffee and cakes.
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Slovanský Dům
Even if you're totally uninterested in its fashion stores (from streetwise Miss Sixty to upmarket Cerruti via preppy Tommy Hilfiger), Prague's leading mall is worth knowing for its restaurants, including Kogo, and its multiplex cinema. The complex was up for sale at the time of writing, but it's unlikely consumers will notice any difference.
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Sparkys
While this is Prague's biggest toy store and hard to miss, it seems firmly aimed at local residents. All the same, you can find traditional toys and marionettes among its collection of teddy bears and DVDs. Enjoy the browse or ask a shop assistant.
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Starožitnosti Alma
Alma specialises in Art Nouveau and Art Deco antiques, and also has a wide selection of rather twee porcelain and lacy items, rather stuffy furniture and glassware, and a veritable army of scary-looking dolls.
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Starožitnosti V. Andrle
Mr Andrle's shop is a little treasure house of antique gold, jewellery, clocks, watches, glassware and ceramics from all over Central Europe, and is a regular port of call for serious collectors from around the world.
