Zhang Garden, Shanghai

Zhang's Garden Shanghai- 2/2023

Zhang's garden (Zhang Yuan) formerly known as Arcadia hall was opened in 1885 as China's first modern pleasure garden, but it later decayed into a neighborhood of dilapidated houses. Its former glory has now been restored in the latest round of urban renewal. The western section of Zhang Garden reopened in 12/2022 as a lively rendezvous point where historic buildings have been converted to boutique stores and pop-up displays of well-established luxury brands like Dior, Louis Vuitton and Vacheron Constantin, etc..

The buildings retained the Shikumen architecture which is a traditional Shanghainese architectural style combining Western and Chinese elements taht first appeared in the 1860s.

At the height of their popularity, there were 9,000 Shikumen buildings in Shanghai.

The front was renovated to their original look as far as possible to retain its historical and cultural charm and also to trigger a sense of Nostalgia among people who used to work and live here.

View of Zhang's Garden (a compound with a bunch of buildings) on the left on Moaming street.

The Shikumen architecture are two or tree story structures resembling Western terrace houses distinguished by high brick wall enclosing a narrow front yard.

One of the many Stone gate entrances into Zhang's garden.

After four year of renovation Zhang's garden, the Western part of the compound looks amazing!

This is really how this building used to look 100 years ago.

We are entering one of the many small alleys in Zhang's garden compound.

Before the renovation this area was totally falling apart with over 1,200 families living in 170 units in the compound's 42 historic buildings. The family were relocated and Zhang's garden became the first urban renewal project in Shanghai to implement a protective expropriation plan.