The Walled City of Kowloon

[MolsonExport]

wikimedia

A poor substitute for the WCK experience, but fascinating never the less: Chunking Mansions, Nathan Rd., Kowloon

The Economist compared it to the Spaceport Cantina in the original Star Wars and quotes anthropologist Gordon Mathews: "whereas the illegalities in Chungking Mansions are widely known, the wondrousness of the place is not."

wikipedia

[Tony]

^ I went in there. It wasn't as interesting as I hoped it would be.

It looks like this now:


IMG_2624 by SSP Tony, on Flickr

I don't know what it looks like inside this one, but the naming is pretty funny:


ps IMG_3194 by SSP Tony, on Flickr

[alps]

I live near the Chungking Mansions and go there to eat sometimes. My building has a similar design but doesn't have as large a shopping mall, as many guesthouses, or foreign merchants. My room is 3.5 sq. metres (37 sq. feet).

[MolsonExport]

Any Chiquitita bananas inside that store where Fernando works? What's the name of the game? Or Chinese hookers asking "Voulez-Vous?"

[mhays]

Originally Posted by alps

I live near the Chungking Mansions and go there to eat sometimes. My building has a similar design but doesn't have as large a shopping mall, as many guesthouses, or foreign merchants. My room is 3.5 sq. metres (37 sq. feet).

This puts the debates some US cities are having about 220 square feet or 150 square feet in context.

I wouldn't want to live in 37 square feet but part of me wouldn't mind it, for a while, particularly if Hong Kong was outside.

[alps]

Originally Posted by mhays

This puts the debates some US cities are having about 220 square feet or 150 square feet in context.

I wouldn't want to live in 37 square feet but part of me wouldn't mind it, for a while, particularly if Hong Kong was outside.

It was easy to measure!

I'm a student and can't afford much better, but you get used to the size. Kinda wish I had some view from my window other than a bleak void space. I dropped a towel down there and have no clue how to access the bottom.

My building was built in 1963, a couple years after the Chungking Mansions. The original apartment was actually a good size, but at some point it was subdivided into five smaller rental units.

[MolsonExport]

I am fascinated by the cultural characteristics that facilitate people to live in social environments characterized by extreme density and lack of personal space (as well as tolerance for otherwise dystopian urban fabrics).

For example, Tseung Kwan O district (also in Hong Kong):

wikipedia

• Video Link

^Despite its wretched appearance to many Western eyes, my understanding is that the place is fully occupied of gainfully employed people. Some of my former students live in the complex.

[Tony]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

I am fascinated by the cultural characteristics that facilitate people to live in social environments characterized by extreme density and lack of personal space (as well as tolerance for otherwise dystopian urban fabrics).

It's because the populations have adapted to using the public realm as their living room and dining room. These itty-bitty units are only used for sleeping and humping (usually).

[Chicago103]

Originally Posted by alps

I live near the Chungking Mansions and go there to eat sometimes. My building has a similar design but doesn't have as large a shopping mall, as many guesthouses, or foreign merchants. My room is 3.5 sq. metres (37 sq. feet).

Is there a bath/toilet area in your room or do you have a shared bathroom with other units? In my view as long as I can sleep, shower and shit in private and there is a world class city just outside my unit I could manage. Actually I have thought about the concept of making apartment that are the same size as pre-1970 standard residential bathrooms, they usually have a sink, a tub/shower and a toilet, the towel closet and place under the sink would be your closets, enough room for a hot plate/microwave on one side of the sink and your bed would be a small mattress in between the tub and toilet/sink or perhaps sleep on the mattress in the tub at night. So basically you have total privacy but nothing else, paradise for introverted devout urbanists. I would call it "urban monk apartments", essentially people who are so religious about urbanism they are willing to give up virtually all earthly possessions to live in an awesome city. Materialism and a desire for space is the slippery slope to SUV's and McMansions on a cul-de-sac.

[MonkeyRonin]

37 sqft!?! Thats not even the size of a king size bed!

I think the smallest I could do is about 72 sqft - or the size of 4 single beds. Here's a floorplan prototype I made for a space of that size:




I'd live there if the price & location were right.

[alps]

Here's a scale model of my room:



I keep some basic food and my possessions on the shelf, and clothing on the rack and in the drawers built into the bottom of the bed. The desk folds down, against the wall, but the door opens outward anyway so I never actually fold it down. I keep cleaning supplies and oatmeal under that.

Originally Posted by Chicago103

Is there a bath/toilet area in your room or do you have a shared bathroom with other units? In my view as long as I can sleep, shower and shit in private and there is a world class city just outside my unit I could manage. Actually I have thought about the concept of making apartment that are the same size as pre-1970 standard residential bathrooms, they usually have a sink, a tub/shower and a toilet, the towel closet and place under the sink would be your closets, enough room for a hot plate/microwave on one side of the sink and your bed would be a small mattress in between the tub and toilet/sink or perhaps sleep on the mattress in the tub at night. So basically you have total privacy but nothing else, paradise for introverted devout urbanists. I would call it "urban monk apartments", essentially people who are so religious about urbanism they are willing to give up virtually all earthly possessions to live in an awesome city. Materialism and a desire for space is the slippery slope to SUV's and McMansions on a cul-de-sac.

Kitchen and bathroom is shared with four other rooms. But my situation definitely affords me a bit more privacy than those of my classmates, who share small rooms, have beds in the tiny living room which the bedrooms open into, etc.

Your idea reminds me of the units in the Nakagin Capsule Tower. But they're probably double the size of my room, at least. Seems people in Japan also have less personal space in domestic life. I lived for a couple months with a friend in a single room. Also stayed briefly with one family (sister, brother, sister's son) who all slept in one room. Not sure that sort of thing would go so harmoniously in some other cultures.

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

I am fascinated by the cultural characteristics that facilitate people to live in social environments characterized by extreme density and lack of personal space (as well as tolerance for otherwise dystopian urban fabrics).

For example, Tseung Kwan O district (also in Hong Kong):

^Despite its wretched appearance to many Western eyes, my understanding is that the place is fully occupied of gainfully employed people. Some of my former students live in the complex.

I wouldn't mind living in Tseung Kwan O except that I couldn't afford it. Newer buildings, good public transport, good public facilities. I questioned whether Westerners would really find it so "wretched" but then I remembered reading online comments on the photography of Michael Wolf. Does it have to do with individualism? I feel like the uniformity of this type of housing is shocking to some mainly because it's so evident compared to the fact that you don't notice the same thing at ground level in some American suburb with mass-produced house designs.

Or is it about space? I've never been inside a McMansion and really have no idea what people fill them with.

Or maybe people associate the look of these estates with failed public housing projects in the west?

Side note: there is some funny distortion in that photo of the Chungking Mansions. Look at the length of those air conditioners on the upper floors!

[MolsonExport]

^very interesting comments. From my travels in Asia (China, Japan, Korea), these gigantic complexes that appear so dystopian to many Westerners seem to function very well as to their intended purposes (affordable and decent if not cramped housing for working and middle-class households). In the West, a few exceptions aside (perhaps Co-OP city in the Bronx), such equivalent projects have often been disasters (e.g., Pruitt-Igoe in St. Louis), or otherwise areas of very high crime and/or decrepitude (e.g., Jane/Finch [Toronto], St. James Town in Toronto, see below for photo (wikipedia):

[dchan]

^ That's because it was called Co-op City, and not Subsidized Public Housing City.

I've visited a friend's apartment in Long Island City, just a few blocks from one of the most notorious public housing projects in NYC. His apartment is located in a small 5-6 building apartment complex that largely follows the same design principles as the failed public housing developments do: a big superblock with a cluster of apartment buildings surrounding a central public courtyard area.

But this is no housing project: it is a co-op apartment complex that is largely middle class and kept in immaculate condition. The residents of the complex look comfortable walking around and relaxing in the central public courtyard because they actually feel safe and comfortable. The only reason that a stranger may feel uncomfortable and unsafe walking around this complex is that we're so conditioned to think that such designs are used exclusively in dangerous housing projects that any apartment complex that follows this design automatically generates a Pavlovian response of fear.

Basically, my point here is that the design is a minor part of what makes a neighborhood safe in the overall scheme. Rather, it's the PEOPLE and their background culture that are the major factors behind how safe and well-kept a neighborhood is.

[Minato Ku]

There are some privatly ownded housing project, built for middle class that have become some big failure.
The best exemple is la Forestiere in Clichy sous Bois in Paris suburbs.


http://parisbanlieue.blog.lemonde.fr...ite-nationale/

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by dchan

Basically, my point here is that the design is a minor part of what makes a neighborhood safe in the overall scheme. Rather, it's the PEOPLE and their background culture that are the major factors behind how safe and well-kept a neighborhood is.

Indeed, which was also my point earlier.

[MolsonExport]

sharii.com
This site references this thread on SSP.

[LouisVanDerWright]

Everyone who is interested in this should check out this interesting AMA on Reddit:

http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comment...stopia_called/

[MolsonExport]

^thanks for that treasure of WCK info/photos. I own a copy of "City of Darkness", and I recommend it very highly.

By its peak in the 1990s, the 6.5 acre Kowloon Walled City was home to at least 33,000 people (with estimates of up to 50,000). That’s a population density of at least 3.2 million per square mile. For New York City to get that dense, every man, woman, and child living in Texas would have to move to Manhattan.

To put it another way, think about living in a 1,200 square foot home. Then imagine yourself living with 9 other people. Then imagine that your building is only one unit of a twelve-story building, and every other unit is as full as yours. Then imagine hundreds those buildings crammed together in a space the size of four football fields.

We can’t really imagine it, either.
read more here: http://99percentinvisible.org/

[MolsonExport]

Bronze cast model of WCK in Kowloon Walled City Park

trevor patt

[MolsonExport]

• Video Link