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It’s a pawn shop. A firecracker factory. Cattle farm. These are elements of the metropolis’ past, but what will the future hold?
Macau residents these days are more likely to be graphic designers, marketing executives, and small business owners than farmers or factory workers. So Macau, Asia’s first European settlement, has gotten creative and repurposed many old buildings to serve a new generation of locals without losing its sense of history.
Wei Zhen Wang, a professor at the University of Hong Kong’s School of Architecture, said the well-preserved nature of Macau’s center is largely due to Portugal and China’s willingness to cooperate.
Macau, a peninsula and two islands in southern China’s Pearl River Delta, opposite Hong Kong, was an important shipping and trade center. It remained a major international trade center throughout the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, and eventually became the pride of Portugal as its last remaining colony.
Meanwhile, just across the ocean, British-ruled Hong Kong was more focused on becoming a global commercial hub than preserving its historic buildings.
Prior to Macau’s return to Chinese rule in 1999, the Portuguese government began developing a comprehensive plan to preserve the city’s historic buildings. After the handover, Chinese authorities maintained many of the existing laws and built upon them.
“The Portuguese laid a good foundation, and the Chinese added to it, creating a story of East meets West,” Wang said. “I think Macau has done a much better job historically and culturally than Hong Kong. Macau has kept things very strict. Almost overregulated.”
The crowning achievement of that work came in 2005, when Macau’s historic center was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. This announcement was convenient for both groups. While the Portuguese were happy to have their heritage in Asia protected and recognized, the Chinese could boast a UNESCO World Heritage Site that was relatively easy for foreign tourists to visit, as Macau did not require a visa for most Western travelers.
Another point of pride is that there are no UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Hong Kong.
In Wang’s opinion, the best example of reimagined architecture in Macau is the former IEC Long Firecracker Factory.
Firecrackers are big business in China. Firecrackers appear at almost all important celebrations and events, such as Chinese New Year, because people believe that loud noises scare away evil spirits.
Iec Long, located in southern Taipa, was the largest of these factories in Macau. But as gaming became the city’s most profitable industry, stores began to close, including Iec Long’s.
Mr Wang remembers visiting Iec Long in the 2000s. At that time, abandoned stone buildings began to bury themselves in the surrounding damp marshes, giving the area a “jungle” feel.
In 2022, this area will be given a new lease of life. A 400-meter (1,300-foot) high wooden platform walkway was constructed to connect the remaining structures, creating a wetland park that intersects with the museum.
“The boardwalk is wonderful,” says Wang. “I’m really happy that this is a public space. It’s got big trees, it’s dense, it’s a bit of an oasis.”
The newly renovated factory is just steps away from Taipa Food Street, a bustling downtown area filled with food stalls and late-night parties. Still, it can feel like a completely separate neighborhood. Mr Wang hopes this will serve as an example of how other cultural heritage areas can be reimagined.
Macau’s main thoroughfare, near the former red-light district, San Malor (Cantonese for “New Avenue”) is an incubator for some of Macau’s most interesting new projects.
This includes Kam Pek Market. This multi-story food hall was used as a gambling venue before being converted into a community center.
“We wanted to bring what was happening at street level indoors and create a seamless connection,” says Briar Hickling, co-founder of design firm Rheinhaus, which worked on the project. The result is 16 food kiosks, bars and seating areas. With Chinese, Korean, Japanese, and Vietnamese cuisine available, and a wide range of prices, locals can gamble just as easily as high rollers in town.
Some of the adaptive reuse buildings around Macau are owned and managed by the city government, with the exception of Cam Pec, which is owned by SJM Resort Group, which also operates some of the city’s largest casinos, most notably the Grand Lisboa Palace.
“They took it upon themselves to breathe a different life into these buildings,” Hickling added. “Their ambition as developers was to defy the usual typologies of new hospitality and often overly ostentatious architecture and reinvigorate this area as a gastronomic landmark in Macau.”
Hickling and her team added a new entrance and accessible bathrooms while preserving many of the building’s original features, namely its 1920s exterior. As a result, she says, “you end up echoing the past while thinking about the future.”
The easiest and quickest way to convert a building is to turn it into a museum. This is what happened at Tak Seng On, a former pawn shop that is now a museum showcasing the history of the industry.
Although stigmatized in the West, pawnshops were an important part of daily life in southern China. Without traditional banks to lend money or provide mortgages, many people relied on pawnshops as a way to obtain cash to start a business or make an important purchase.
It also has a unique architectural style. Guangdong Pawnshop is an easy building to find. There is a large and high wall inside the entrance to protect the safety of goods and owners. On the outside, there is a sign with a distinctive shape that resembles an upside-down bat holding a coin, so even people who cannot read kanji can easily recognize the store.
But with the advent of banks, not to mention online payment apps, pawnshops have become less common in southern China. Rather than demolish the building, which is just a stone’s throw from Kampek Market, the city turned it into a museum. Today, visitors can see traditional items that pawnbrokers used in their work, such as metal scales to weigh goods and tickets to track goods, as well as understand the history of these businesses during colonial times.
Macau’s agricultural history is mostly in the past, but there are a few remnants if you know where to look, such as the occasional “No Cattle Crossing” sign on a narrow road.
But one remaining part of Macau’s agricultural past has been creatively transformed. A former cow shed in the historic Mong Ha district of northern Macau, it has been a studio and gallery space dedicated to contemporary art since 2003.
Any Macau resident can apply for space in the former cowshed. The building’s most famous tenant is the aptly named Ox Warehouse, which hosts shows by artists from China and other parts of the world.
In a city with 700,000 people packed into roughly 13 square miles, having a dedicated space for artists to work is invaluable. It also means that some young Macau residents may already be working on the city’s next big adaptive reuse project.
Designer Hickling says he is optimistic about Macau’s future.
“There is potential and opportunity to think more about what kind of architecture can be done in Macau,” she says. “It’s great to bring these historic facades to life. It’s great to see them taking the initiative. It gives Macau a great identity.”
