Terrain Road Urban Road Sea
5 Urban roads in Xiamen, 1920s
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Common Frameworks, Part 1
Urban Fabric
Qilou The qilou (or shop-house; the literal translation is “riding horse building” because it projects into the street like the forequarters of a horse) was the dominant type in Xiamen from the 1920s to the 1960s. After the political instability around the turn of the century subsided and more trading links were established, an increasing number of returning Chinese émigrés brought Western architectural and urban models into an increasingly active commercial and trading city. In 1628, Emperor Chongzhen issued an edict that Xiamen was to be restricted to military use. All commercial activity was ordered to be halted. Emperor Kangxi of the Qing Dynasty (which lasted from 1644 to 1912) continued this policy, consolidating the city’s position as a key component in the defense of China’s eastern coast.6 Xiamen also became an administrative and political center for the region. Despite Emperor Chongzhen’s edict, in the later years of Emperor Kangxi’s reign (1700–1720), increasing population pressures and the proximity to Taiwan and other developing Southeast Asian countries gave rise to business activities.7 A century later, Emperor Jiaqing issued orders making Xiamen the “commercial gateway” to Fujian province. The transition from military port to commercial city was greatly accelerated by the Opium Wars in the nineteenth century. The Treaty of Nanking signed by the Chinese and British governments in 1842 named Xiamen and four other cities treaty ports, opening them to foreign trade. The treaty marked the transformation of Xiamen into a commercial and trading hub with strong ties to the rest of the world. Gulangyu, the smaller of Xiamen’s islands, was occupied by the British, furthering the transfer of Western practices into the old city: modern urban infrastructure, commercial environments, Western living conditions, and many outside investors. To capitalize on the circumstances of Gulangyu, and also to attract outside investment, the Xiamen city council instigated urban planning policy to reform and modernize the city. These efforts included demolishing the old city wall, improving infrastructure, and creating commercial streets (fig. 5). Sixty to seventy percent of the 13.3-million-yuan cost was financed by the overseas Chinese community, and between 1920 and 1927, Xiamen was slowly transformed into a “modern city.” This period saw the first roads built to foreign standards, such as Zhongshan Road and South