Kowloon Walled City (Chinese: 九龍寨城) was an extremely densely populated and largely ungoverned enclave of China within the boundaries of Kowloon City, British Hong Kong.
Built as an Imperial Chinese military fort, the walled city became a de jure enclave after the New Territories were leased to the United Kingdom in 1898. Its population increased dramatically after the end of the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong during World War II, attracting mostly refugees fleeing the renewed Chinese Civil War.
By the late 1980s, the walled city contained roughly 35,000 residents[1] within its territory of 2.6 hectares (6.4 acres; 26,000 m2). As a result of the absence of any widely recognized bureaucracy, the city's residents and businesses had no municipal codes with which to adhere. Stemming further from the anarchic nature of the area, businesses that dealt in otherwise banned products, ranging from narcotics to dog meat, thrived. From the 1950s to the 1970s, it was controlled by local triads and had high rates of prostitution, gambling, and drug abuse.
In January 1987, the British colonial government announced plans to demolish the walled city. After an arduous eviction process, and the transfer of de jure sovereignty of the enclave from China to Britain, demolition began in March 1993 and was completed in April 1994.
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For a now out-of-print book titled Kowloon City: An Illustrated Guide, artist Hitomi Terasawa drew a meticulous cross-sectioned rendering of the urban phenomenon to preserve its memory. The massive panorama peers into the compact neighborhood, glimpsing narrow dance halls, laundry dangling from balconies, and entire factories tucked inside cramped quarters.
Thanks to psychologist Greg Jensen, we now have a stunning high-resolution scan of Terasawa’s illustration complete with annotations and diagramming. It’s worth viewing the full panorama in its entirety to zoom in on all the details of this infamous city.
https://www.thisiscolossal.com/2024/07/ ... ustration/
