Housing construction in Guangzhou colonial period
Abstract
Housing construction in Guangzhou colonial period
Incoming article date: 15.12.2024The colonial period lasted in China from 1840 to 1949. During this time the economy and culture of traditional China underwent significant changes. The influence of European culture was strongly reflected in the architecture of Guangzhou. The compositional solutions of facades and stylistic techniques of residential buildings bear the features of European architecture. The purpose of this article is to analyze the types of residential buildings erected in Guangzhou during the colonial period and to determine their specific features. The following methods were used in the study: • comprehensive field surveys, photo recording and landscape-visual analysis of Guangzhou buildings erected during the colonial period; • historical and urban planning analysis of literary, cartographic and iconographic sources; • study of archival and design materials such as: - analysis of the work of Chinese architects of the late 19th - early 20th centuries, who studied in Europe and the USA, - analysis of the creative methods of European architects who arrived in Guangzhou during the colonial period. At the beginning of the colonial period, due to the rapid development of industry and trade, urban land was in short supply. Therefore, the plots of land acquired for construction had the shape of an elongated rectangle, when a short part of the plot faced the street. Hence the Zhutong commercial and residential buildings emerged, one of the traditional forms of residence in Guangzhou, widespread in the colonial period. The planning scheme of the new type of Guangzhou development - the Chilou houses, which formed long sections of streets with arcades, also arose on the basis of the Zhutong house. Typical examples of colonial architecture, in the layout of which features of a traditional Chinese house appear, although the facades are made in the style of the neo-Renaissance, are the Xiguan mansions and houses in the Shamian concession. Like the Chilou houses, which form pedestrian streets with their galleries, the facades of residential buildings of the colonial period have a completely European appearance, but the planning structure is based on the structure of a traditional Chinese house.
Keywords: Guangzhou, colonial period, European trends, traditional Chinese architecture, volumetric-spatial solutions, housing construction