
The former Royal Asiatic Society building
Far from the maddening crowds on the Bund, the Rockbund Art Museum on Huqiu Lu (虎丘路) is a favored destination that singularly embodies the East meets West history, design and architecture of…
Far from the maddening crowds on the Bund, the Rockbund Art Museum on Huqiu Lu (虎丘路) is a favored destination that singularly embodies the East meets West history, design and architecture of…
I’ve always liked the predictability and soothing effect of uncomplicated patterns. This was one reason why I found myself standing in front of a discreet entrance off the…
What makes a shikumen (石库门) header an architectural tapestry so emblematic of Shanghai? The grey stone pediment, shaped in a triangle or semi-circle, contains designs that range from the…
Readers have noted how quiet the blog has been. I confess to its woeful neglect but would point them towards the blog’s Facebook page which continues to brim with photographs and factoids of Old…
There is nothing quite like watching history in movement, the flickering of black and white, and jerky movements of humans and machine caused by the limitation of old…
What I love about photographing old shikumens and lilongs are the designs and motifs threaded into the exterior and interior of the buildings. How elaborate or simple, modern…
If you look closely, the legacy of Japanese presence in pre-war and war-time Shanghai can be found across the city’s old neighborhoods, dating back to their emergence as…
The streets have grown quieter. As Siwen Lane (斯文里) in Jingan district empties out ahead of demolition and redevelopment, the surrounding neighborhoods are anticipating changes too. New basketball courts,…
Every time I travel along the busy Henan Lu (河南路), I watch for the blue plastic awnings that dot each window of the seemingly nondescript building. The walls are…
Buried amidst the largely demolished Chengyu Lane (成裕里) (or Achieving Abundance Lane) on Fuxing Zhong Lu (复兴中路), a mountain of debris hid a small piece of the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP)…