Architectural history of Shanghai alley

Shanghainese call it alley, which is different from the traditional houses in the south of China and other western architectural forms. However, it always bears more or less traces of China's traditional architecture and is more or less influenced by foreign architecture. It can best represent the characteristics of modern Shanghai urban culture and is also the most direct product of modern Shanghai history.

The city of Shanghai is like a living organism. Looking down from the air, the criss-crossing roads are like arteries, dividing the city into several communities; Within each residential area, there are many small passages between buildings, which are densely distributed all over the city, as small as capillaries but full of vitality. Different times, different regions and different nationalities have different names for these small passages, and Shanghainese call them "alley".

"Lane" ancient Chinese characters "Lane Tang". "Tang" is the main road in front of the ancient court or ancestral temple. This Chinese character appeared in the Book of Songs more than two thousand years ago. It had many meanings in ancient Chinese. Later, as a "road", this meaning was gradually diluted by history. In modern times, people can't remember the connection between the word "Tang" and architecture, so they use another interesting Chinese character "Tang" instead. "Tang" used to be a name for a room, which had little to do with roads and alleys. However, in modern Chinese, it is more closely related to architecture than "Tang" and homophonic with "Tang", so "Lane" has evolved into "Lane".

In fact, it is not only Shanghainese who call it "Lane", but also the Jiangnan area of China. However, the alley can be as famous as the hutong in Beijing, mainly because of the rise of a large number of alley houses in modern Shanghai. The origin of this alley can be traced back to the last century.

After the First Opium War, Shanghai was turned into a "trading port" and foreigners were allowed to live and do business here. 1845, the local government of Shanghai at that time published the Shanghai Land Charter, which formally stipulated the scope of the first concession, the method of land lease and the municipal management measures in the concession, and made it clear, becoming the earliest legal provisions of foreign concessions in Shanghai. In this charter, it is clearly stipulated that "outsiders are not allowed to rent houses to China people", which led to the early situation of "China and foreign countries were divided". That is to say, in the first few years of Shanghai's opening, except for the original China residents in the concession, other China people were not allowed to move into the concession, and foreigners in the concession did not engage in real estate business activities in their economic and trade activities.

However, the uprising of the Knife Society changed this situation. 1In September, 853, the Knife Society occupied the county seat of Shanghai and launched a tug-of-war with the Qing army for one and a half years. A large number of residents of Chenghuang Temple moved to safer foreign concessions to escape the war, and the rule of "dividing China and foreign countries" was completely broken. 1854, the British, American and French consuls simply set aside the China government and revised the land charter by themselves, completely deleting the prohibition of building houses and renting houses to China people, and "China people live with foreigners" was recognized by law. In the Concession, it is finally "legal" for foreign businessmen to engage in real estate business. At the same time, the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom made Nanjing its capital, conquered Zhenjiang, and marched into Shanghai three times in the 1960s, forcing a large number of landlords, squires, wealthy businessmen and bureaucrats in Jiangsu and Zhejiang provinces to take refuge in the Shanghai Concession with their families. Before 1853, there were only 500 China people in the concession, and 1854 surged to 20,000, and 1865 nearly150,000. After a large number of Chinese entered the concession, it greatly stimulated the real estate business activities in the concession. Because there are more people and fewer rooms, the house price is surprisingly high, and the profit can be as high as 30~40%. Many foreign businessmen have found that building houses for China people and choosing to live in them can make profits far greater than and faster than the profits from trade, and there is no risk. Therefore, most foreign businessmen quickly transferred their business and interests to real estate management. Some early famous foreign firms, such as Lao Sha Xun, Yihe and Yanji, used to be mainly engaged in opium trade, but now they invest heavily in real estate management. Many foreign businessmen even borrow money to build houses for rent or sale.

The houses originally built in the Concession and rented to China people are all made of wooden boards, with low cost, simple construction and fast construction speed. From September 1853 to July 1854, less than a year, Guangdong Road, Fujian Road. More than 800 simple wooden houses have been built for rent. This kind of rented wooden house generally adopts the overall layout of row by row, with the name of "Li", which is the prototype of Shanghai alley later. By 1863, there were 8,740 such houses under the name of "Li". After 1870, this simple wooden house was banned by the concession authorities because it was flammable and unsafe. However, because a large number of rented houses can bring the most important tax source to the concession authorities, the real estate business activities have not stopped, but have become more and more prosperous. However, the early simple wooden house was completely replaced by a new type of house-Shikumen Lane. Since then, the alley has officially stepped onto the stage of Shanghai's urban construction activities and played an increasingly important role. After the simple wooden houses were banned, new houses built with traditional vertical wooden structures and brick walls in China began to appear in the Shanghai Concession. This kind of house is much more formal and durable than the early wooden houses. Its plane and space are closer to the traditional two-story and three-story quadrangles in the south of the Yangtze River, which is more suitable for the permanent residence of China residents. Although it can't compare with the traditional houses in the past, the courtyard is deep, and you can't chisel stones, enjoy flowers and fold willows, but after all, you still keep a well-organized and relatively complete guest room. The upstairs is a quiet inner room and an ordinary hatchback, which is more suitable for those Shanghainese who have left the past pace of life and started a modern urban life, but are more or less attached to the traditional life. This kind of folk house basically maintains the relatively closed characteristics of traditional folk houses in China. Although I live in downtown, I can form my own system and unite the front behind closed doors. So this door is becoming more and more important. It always has a stone door frame with solid planks with black paint and a pair of copper rings. This architectural style is called Shikumen by Shanghainese. In order to distinguish it from the later new Shikumen dwellings, the early Shikumen dwellings were also called the old Shikumen dwellings. On the whole, Shikumen units are lined up, showing a vertical housing layout in the west. Rows of Shikumen houses form alleys.

Most of the earliest alley houses are located in the west of Huangpu River, east of Nichengbang (now Tibet Road), south of Suzhou River and north of the old city, which is today's Huangpu District. For example, it is built in 1872, located in Xingrenli, south of beijing east road, north of Ningbo Road and east of Henan Middle Road; Located in Gongshunli, Guangdong Road, etc. By the beginning of the 20th century, there were still a large number of old Shikumen Hutong under construction. For example, Hongdeli, located in Zhejiang Middle Road and Xiamen Road; Zhaofuli, located in hankou road and Henan Middle Road; Li Fuxiang is located between Guangxi Road, Yunnan Road and Fuzhou Road.

19 At the end of the 20th century, influenced by the houses in the Lane in the concession, a large number of houses in the Lane began to be built inside and outside the old city of Shanghai. Such as Sheep Lane, Dunren Lane and Li Jixiang in Heather Dou Shi Street. In addition, there is a house in an alley in Hudong area, and the simulation is relatively simple. This kind of alley is usually a single room, two stories high, and looks like an old-fashioned house in Guangdong, called Cantonese alley. For example, the Eighth Generation Head of Tongbei Road, which was built around 1900, is a typical example of early Cantonese alley.

After the 20th century, Shanghai's real estate business activities became more active. In addition to the established Shaxun Foreign Firm and Jardine Matheson Foreign Firm, most of them have turned their main business to real estate management, and new real estate developers have mushroomed. For example, Harbin Foreign Firm 190 1 opened, American Chinese Construction Company 1902 opened, and Bishang Yipin Real Estate Company 1905 opened, all of which were very influential real estate developers at that time. Stimulated by a large number of rising real estate industries, alley houses are unprecedentedly prosperous, and their distribution in cities is also greatly expanded.

In the 20th century10s, some changes took place in Shanghai Shikumen Hutong. The scale of hutong is bigger than before, and the plane, structure, form and decoration are different from the original Shikumen Hutong. The unit occupies a smaller area and the plane is more compact. The traditional three-bay and five-bay plane forms are rarely used, but a large number of single-bay and double-bay planes have been replaced. In ancient Shikumen houses, brick walls are often used to replace traditional columns to bear the load. The walls are mostly blue bricks or red bricks, but they are rarely painted with lime as in the past. Shikumen itself is more decorative, but the traditional decorative themes in China are gradually decreasing, and more and more decorative themes are influenced by western-style architecture. This kind of alley is called Xinshikumen Lane or later Shikumen Lane. Its distribution is also wider than that of the old Shikumen Hutong. Typical examples are Baokangli in Huaihai Middle Road (19 14), Li Daqing in Nanjing East Road (19 15), Zhulianli in Beijing West Road (19 15) and Laohui Li Le in Yunnan Middle Road.

After World War I, Shanghai real estate entered a golden age. By 1930s, there were more than 300 real estate agents in Shanghai. The rise of real estate stimulated the prosperity of Shanghai's construction industry, and also brought another architectural climax of hutong architecture. The 1920s was the most prosperous period of the New Shikumen Hutong. Due to the rising land price and the high development of buildings, the traditional two-story Shikumen residence began to develop to three floors, and indoor sanitary equipment began to appear. The new Shikumen Hutong in this period, such as Shang Xian Square (1934), Siming Village (1928), Mei Lanfang (1930) and Fuming Village (193 1), all had considerable influence.

While building a large number of new Shikumen Hutong, a new living form of Hutong-New Hutong-also evolved from it. The new alley cancelled Shikumen as a living form, and the closed courtyard became an open or semi-open green courtyard. Formally, it imitates the western architectural style more than the traditional architectural style of China. All kinds of building equipment are also relatively complete. Its distribution also develops from the east to the west of the city. Verdun Garden (1925), Fei Xia Square (1927), Jing 'an Villa (1929) and Yongquan Square (1936) are among the most famous modern alleys.

/kloc-after the 1930 s, the new alley was further developed and a higher standard garden-style alley house evolved. This kind of residence has changed from a long strip to a semi-independent one, paying attention to the environmental greening between buildings. The interior layout and appearance are close to independent private houses, and the style is mostly Spanish or modern. For example, Fulv New Village built by 1936, Shanghuayuan by 1934, and Shanghai New Village by 1939.

There are also some garden hutongs, which are not one or two in each house, but like apartments, each floor has one or several sets of units with different standards. This kind of garden alley is also called apartment alley. For example, Xinkang Garden built in 1934 and Yongjia New Village built in 1940s. Garden-style alley and apartment-style alley, except for the overall layout and some patch layout characteristics similar to traditional alley, their building units can hardly be regarded as alley houses.

Early Shikumen

Early Shikumen Early Shikumen Hutong, also known as Old Shikumen Hutong, was born in the early 1970s of 19. It developed greatly at the end of last century and the beginning of this century, and was gradually replaced by new Shikumen after 1940s.

The biggest feature of the early Shikumen Hutong was the adoption of units with strong spatial characteristics of traditional houses in the south of the Yangtze River and the overall layout in the form of western-style townhouses. So from the beginning, it has the color of combining Chinese and western.

Its unit plane basically comes from the residential form of three-way courtyard or quadrangle in China traditional houses, which is usually three-bay or five-bay. The main part is two floors, and the attached houses at the back are single floors. To a certain extent, the style of closed deep house compound of traditional houses in China has been maintained, but the area scale has been greatly reduced and the space has become cramped and compact. In the longitudinal arrangement, there is an obvious central axis, and the planes are always symmetrically arranged. After entering the door, it is a square courtyard, which is not as deep as the courtyard in traditional houses, but it can also reflect some spatial characteristics of the courtyard. Facing the patio is the living room, with a detachable French window (in the form of a traditional grid door in simplified Chinese) facing the patio. The living room is generally about 4 meters wide and 6 meters deep, which is used for the most important ceremonial activities such as parties, celebrations and banquets in China's traditional daily life. There are secondary rooms on both sides of the living room, and left and right wing rooms on both sides of the patio. At the back of the living room, there is a horizontal one-way wooden escalator leading to the second floor. After that, it is the back patio. The depth of the back patio is generally half that of the front patio, and there is a well. Behind the back patio is a single-story kitchen, storage room and other ancillary rooms. This layout basically meets the traditional life style and living concept of China families, saves land and adapts to the new urban space conditions in the concession.

The load-bearing structure of the old Shikumen Hutong mostly adopts the most common vertical wood frame and brick wall enclosure structure in Jiangnan residential buildings. Its columns are generally Chinese fir, with a diameter of about 15 cm, and 4 or 5 columns fall to the ground.

Building materials and structural methods are also the direct inheritance of traditional houses in the south of the Yangtze River. The decoration style of the building also presents the characteristics of traditional Jiangnan folk houses. The gable in the form of horse head wall or Guanyin pocket is often seen on the facade, and the floor-to-ceiling windows, hanging eaves and lattice windows of the living room in the patio all come from traditional practices. Compared with traditional buildings, the biggest difference is Shikumen along the lane, which forms the most obvious personality of Shikumen Hutong dwellings. The elevation along one side of the roadway is generally composed of Shikumen courtyard wall and slightly higher wing gables on both sides. The single-storey annex building at the back adopts a single-slope roof, and the slope is raised backwards. So the height of the back wall is close to the fa? ade, forming a circle of basically closed fa? ade, which is really quiet in the noise. No matter how noisy the neighbors are, they can hide in the small building to form a unified mood. There is a Shikumen at the position where the facade is located at the central axis of the unit. The early Shikumen was generally simple, that is, a simple stone door frame with a thick wooden door and black paint inside. Later, I began to pay attention to the decoration of Shikumen itself. Generally, there are triangular, arc or rectangular carvings above the stone door frame, which are made of brick or cement. Their composition and patterns began to be influenced by western architectural styles. Some door decorations have completely turned into mountain flowers on the west lintel or window lintel, forming the most distinctive landscape of Shikumen Hutong.

If the early single building of Shikumen Hutong basically maintained the characteristics of traditional houses, then its overall layout was more influenced by western townhouses. In terms of layout, there are both north-south and east-west directions, mainly considering the use of terrain and building more houses, and paying little attention to orientation. The lane width is narrow, only about 3 meters. Generally speaking, it makes no difference to always get it.

Later Shikumen

Later Shikumen Hutong, also known as the New Shikumen Hutong, appeared after this century 10.

There are few aircraft with three or five cabins, but it is more common to have two or even one cabin. The traditional two-story Shikumen house began to become three-story. A rear wing and a pavilion appeared behind. There are several reasons for this change: first, the rise of urban land price has brought about a sharp rise in housing prices, and the social affordability of large-scale residential prices has been greatly reduced. Real estate developers have to consider reducing the area of residential units, demanding more compact residential space and higher development. Second, at that time, the small and medium-sized apartment structure of Shanghai residents became more and more common, and the demand for small apartments increased accordingly. Third, the income of citizens is divided, and there are housing needs of different economic levels.

In the later period, the structural system of the alley house in Shikumen changed from the early wooden structure of Shikumen to the load-bearing brick wall and the wooden roof. Brick coupons began to appear in alleys, street buildings, doors and windows. Steel-gold concrete is also widely used. Pavilions and pavilions use steel-gold concrete floors. Shikumen door frames are mostly clear water bricks or painted water stones, and stone door frames are rarely used again.

From the overall layout, the buildings are arranged more neatly, and there are obvious differences between the general layout and the support layout. The width of the main lane is increased, taking into account the needs of cars entering and leaving. Ventilation and lighting problems are also getting more and more attention. Generally speaking, the size of alleys also expanded earlier, sometimes even including the whole block.

The house decoration style in the late Shikumen Hutong has also changed greatly compared with the early one. Horsehead wall or Guanyin pocket gables are no longer used. The roofs are mostly machine-made tiles rather than small blue tiles, and the external walls are mostly clear water blue bricks, red bricks or green red brick cement bricks with lime jointing. The early lime-white wall is gone. Architectural detail decoration began to imitate the treatment methods of western architecture in a large number. Most of the gates and lintels of Shikumen are decorated with western-style mountain flowers. There are often prominent balconies on the front. The architectural style is becoming more and more westernized.

Lixinshi lane

The new alley is a new type evolved from the new Shikumen alley, which first appeared in the mid-1920s.

Generally speaking, the unit plane of the new alley is no longer limited by single bay and double bay, but is more freely arranged indoors. Living room, bedroom, kitchen and bathroom have clear functional distinction. Generally, there are relatively complete sanitary equipment and kitchen equipment. Some people even arranged a garage.

Compared with Shikumen Hutong, the most obvious difference of the new Hutong is that the Shikumen at each door is gone, replaced by copper and iron gate. The height of the fence is greatly reduced or replaced by a low fence, or even separated by a hedge. Small patios are sometimes replaced by open or semi-open green courtyards. The architectural form imitates the western style more than the traditional decoration in China.

New alleys are generally three stories high, and a large number of steel-gold concrete members and brick walls are used to bear the load. Steel windows have become quite popular.

From the general layout, attention is paid to the ventilation and orientation of the house, so it is generally horizontally connected. The width of the driveway has increased, generally more than 5 meters, taking into account both the needs of private cars entering the car and the needs of fire fighting.

Garden Lane and Apartment Lane

Garden Lane is a higher standard residential form and a further development of the new alley. This kind of residence has changed from a townhouse to a semi-detached house, paying more attention to the greening and environment between buildings. The living style of the houses in the garden has been completely westernized, and the functions of all kinds of rooms are arranged according to the western lifestyle, and generally have a more reasonable and clear functional layout. Buildings are generally three stories high, and some even have four stories high. The story height and area are larger than other alley buildings, and the equipment standards and decoration standards are also higher.

Judging from the architectural style, most of the gardens and alleys are western-style. It can be said that this kind of alley has some characteristics similar to the traditional alley in the overall layout, and it should actually be regarded as a garden house.

Apartment alley and garden alley are similar and appear at the same time. The difference is that it is no longer a joint house, but an assembled house with different living units arranged in layers.

The appearance of apartment-style alley marks the end of Shanghai alley construction.