Coming Down Alert – Shaanxi Road and Nanchang Road

Things look a bit grim for the corner of Shaanxi Road and Nanchang Road (Avenue Roi Albert and Route Dolfus). Despite assurances from some local officials that only ‘unsavable’ buildings in the former French Concession would be bulldozed now it seems this rather nice corner structure will not survive. In the past preservation orders have been enforced until, well, the day they’re not enforced and the bulldozers go in. Most recently this building was a restaurant on the ground floor and apartments upstairs and both the residents and the business have been evicted and the building is now just about empty. It may be that some sort of refurbishment is occurring though the owner of a small cigarette kiosk next door told me she thought it was coming down for a new apartment complex (yes, another one) and that she too would be out within the month.

Of course opposite is the former Xiang Yang Market that was shut a few years back to make way for another skyscraping office block of dubious design to occupy the block between Xiang Yang and Shaanxi Roads and backed by Nanchang Road. It’s well on the way to going up and the plans make it look about as exciting as any other modern block – the basic inverted shoe box covered in shiny marble, soulless lobby, bereted square badges etc, etc, similar to the dreary and inhuman relatively new office blocks on two of the corners of Huai Hai Road and Xiang Yang Road (Avenue Joffre and Route Lorton).

I’ve always rather liked this building – not great masterpiece of art-deco or modernism, just a nice functional building with big windows and a corner location. It’ll be a shame if it is reduced to rubble but no great surprise.