Before it gets perhaps a little too hot in Hong Kong you might like to take my VoiceMap GPS walking tour that takes you through Hong Kong’s little visited art-deco gems in Kowloon. Download here or use the app in the Apple store (here)… The blurb for the tour is below…
Kowloon Peninsula is a window onto Hong Kong’s architectural evolution.
On this walking tour, you’ll discover some of the most impressive yet overlooked Art Deco and Modernist structures near Hong Kong’s vibrant local markets. From villas commissioned by wealthy merchants to modernist apartment buildings, schools, and churches, you’ll see how avant-garde architectural trends reached this corner of the British Empire during a crucial period of its development in the 1900s.
The tour starts at Mary Knoll Convent School on Waterloo Road, with its fascinating blend of Art Deco and Gothic Revival styles. You’ll weave past the startlingly modern St. Teresa’s and see what is perhaps Hong Kong’s finest Art Deco treasure on Prince Edward Road West.
You’ll ascend Kadoorie Hill and the Braga Circuit to find an often overlooked enclave of Art Deco villas. Each property features distinctive architectural elements like wraparound balconies, curved edges, and nautical motifs.
The tour ends at Mong Kok East MTR Station, where working-class hustle-and-bustle contrasts with the exclusive residences of Kadoorie Hill.
On this 90-minute tour, you’ll also have a chance to:
Explore the once-significant Boundary Street, which formerly marked the border between British-controlled Kowloon and Qing Dynasty territory
Appreciate the detailed Art Deco wave patterns and cantilevered balconies of Prince Edward Road West’s meticulously restored apartments
Walk through Yuen Po Bird Market, where songbird enthusiasts still gather to socialise and compare their prized avian companions
Find out how the evolution of the Garden Cities Movement and the international style of Art Deco in Kowloon Tong influenced Kowloon’s architecture
Discover the Braga Circuit, a mews-like street named after prominent Macanese businessman José Braga
Admire Kadoorie Hill’s luxurious villas featuring Streamlined Moderne styling with high ceilings, Crittall windows, and curved edges
Visit St. Teresa’s Roman Catholic Church, an intriguing blend of Romanesque architecture and Art Deco influences
Browse the vibrant Mong Kok Flower Market, a glimpse of traditional Hong Kong culture that persists amid rapid urbanisation.
This tour is a rare opportunity to explore an overlooked architectural enclave that survived Hong Kong’s development frenzy. By the end, you’ll have a sense of how European design sensibilities were adapted to the tropical climate of this dynamic colonial port city.
Unsurprisingly for a bio by two sci-fi writers The Illuminated man focuses largely on Ballard’s novels and his hyper-surrealism that really redefined British sci-fi in the decades after WW2. The authors cover Ballard’s Shanghai origins and time in Lunghwa Internment Camp.
FYI: here’s my take on the influences of Shanghai on Ballard’s later writing from the Los Angeles Review of Books in 2021 – Ballardian Dystopias in Wartime Shanghai
This portrait of the artist and writer Chiang Yee (Jiang Yi) by Xu Beihong was up for sale last year at Bonham’s in New York. It obviously didn’t sell as now it’s being offered by Bonham’s in Hong Kong (for an asking price of US$41K-57K on April 28th here). Sadly Chiang Yee doesn’t fetch serious prices these days, but Xu Beihong does. He’s much appreciated in the PRC and has his own Xu Beihong Memorial Museum in Beijing (which was closed for “refurbishment” when I tried to visit in late 2025). Xu travelled in Europe extensively in the 1930s and visited London in 1933, where Chiang Yee was living in Belsize Park (you can listen to my BBC Radio 3 doc on Chiang, his friends and London here or read the collection of essays on the subject edited by Da Zhang, Paul Bevan and Anne Witchard, Chiang Yee and his Circle).
Do you remember the days of the Shanghai International Literary Festival at M on the Bund? Literary events at Capital M in Beijing and M on the Fringe in Hong Kong? Heady days!!
Well, this year M is back with the M Festival in the grounds of the historic Abbaye Notre-Dame de Nanteuil in Nanteuil-en-Vallée, southwestern France…. It’ll all be happening on a packed weekend across July 25 and 26 with books, as well as music and (of course) food. Festival passes are priced at just €50 per person for the entire weekend. And here’s the speaker list:
Alan Hollinghurst, Amy Tan, Fuchsia Dunlop, Marie NDaiye, Victor Mallet, Paul French, Anne Sebba, Audrey Sedano, Pauline Dreyfus, Simone Gelin, Tash Aw, Laurent Morin, Pankaj Mishra, Aube Rey Lescure, Yin Myo Su – Misuu, Jean Marc Souvira, Helen Scales…
For more details, tickets, travel details and accommodation click here…
I posted last month (here and here) on the mothballing of a number of longtang in Shanghai – emptied out, boarded up and awaiting…. well, what? the wrecking ball or refurbishment? Across the city this is the case – presumably a halt called as so many property companies in Shanghai have gone bust. Sometimes economic woes are a preservationist’s best friend.
And here another example – a traditional shikumen stone gateway – 里康餘: Li Kang Yu; 29弄: Lane 29 on Shouning Lu (Rue Buissonnet) just east of Xizang Nan Lu (Boulevard de Montigny). Constructed 1935. Cleared and boarded up some years ago and now just seemingly forgotten…. Such “mothballed” shikumen proliferate across Shanghai awaiting their fate…
Welcome to the Palace of Dragons and step into a world of flight, fantasy and magic. DRAGONS at the Royal Pavilion explores the power, beauty and mystery of the world’s most iconic mythical creatures.
Discover the dragons that watch over the Royal Pavilion itself, carved in splendour, glimmering in gold or hiding in unexpected places. Follow the dragons’ footsteps and discover fearsome beasts and elegant symbols of myth and power.
Go on a dragon quest, find dragon eggs and help the baby dragons find their way home. Step into the dragon’s mouth, search for dragons in the mirrors, listen to roaring dragons in the palace halls, relax with a story, and be a Royal Pavilion Dragon Detective.
In the Prince Regent Gallery Fire and Water: Dreaming of Dragons takes you on a journey around the world, revealing how dragons have captured people’s imagination in European and Asian cultures.
I have a few copies of Midnight in Peking in Polish if there are any Poles out there missing Pekinie?? Email me on paul@chinarhyming.com – as ever first come, first served, and sorry but I can’t mail to the USA or PRC.
