A Story of History and Tong Lau

Yuen Kut Lam is the oldest existing first-generation Tong Lau in Hong Kong. It was built more than 130 years ago. The tour guide will take the group into this tenement house to learn about the style and architectural art of the tenement house at that time.

The second stop in Sheung Wan is to visit the tenement houses built in the 1950s and located on Wing Lee Street. The biggest feature here is that it was once famous for filming a Hong Kong movie called "Echoes of the Rainbow". It is also one of the best spots for tourists to take photos.

Taking the subway to Wan Chai, we will taste the classic old Hong Kong-style tea restaurant food and listen to the tour guide’s explanation of the story of when this restaurant was operating at No. 7 Mauro Street (an old tenement house).

The next stop is about a 10-minute walk to the Blue House. This pre-war tenement building still retains traces of its past life. One of the units retains the original cubicle room furnishings for display purposes, but you can only visit it through a docent. The interior of the building still retains its original solid wood structure, which is rare in Hong Kong.

We will take the subway to Kowloon District and visit a luxurious pre-war tenement house - Lui Seng Chun. It was built in 1931. The ground floor is the Lei Shengchun Medical Clinic and pharmacy opened by Chinese medicine practitioner Lei Ruide. The upper three floors are the residences of Lei Liang's family members. It combines the horizontal line design of modern streamline style with classical elements, and can be said to be the representative of Hong Kong's pre-war arcade-style architecture.

The last stop was No. 618, Shanghai Street. It consists of a row of 14 buildings with street numbers from 600 to 626. The buildings are 3 to 6 stories high and are mainly made of brick walls, concrete or wood. Among them, 10 arcade-style buildings were built between 1920 and 1926 and were rated as Grade II historic buildings by the Hong Kong Antiquities Advisory Board; the other four 6-storey buildings were built between 1963 and 1964 after the war and are reinforced concrete buildings. No. 618 Shanghai Street combines the architectural features of southern Chinese street houses and Western pillar-style buildings. This type of arcade became popular in Guangdong and Hong Kong from the late 19th century to the early post-war period, and became the main feature of Hong Kong's commercial streets.