Archinect - News

The Life and Death of an Impossible City

2014-08-13T17:38:00-04:00

City of Darkness Revisited is a photo book and cultural history of Kowloon Walled City, a largely ungoverned, densely populated enclave within Hong Kong.[...] It was like nothing else in Hong Kong: a mass of interconnected 12- and 14-story buildings forming a single huge structure, its facade glowing from the light of hundreds of apartments and shops. Clearly there was no administrative oversight. It was too dense, too ad-hoc, too unrestrained. All this was clear before even entering the place.

A recent Kickstarter campaign helped photographers Greg Girard and Ian Lambot fund and complete the new edition of their book, City of Darkness Revisited, about life in Hong Kong's legendary Kowloon Walled City.

WSJ's beautifully crafted story of the Kowloon Walled City

2014-04-28T19:31:00-04:00

Hong Kong's Kowloon Walled City was the densest place on the planet before it was torn down 20 years ago. In this Wall Street Journal interactive, you can take a trip through the city, explore its history and hear from the people who lived there.

The WSJ has developed an impressive rich-media piece on the Kowloon Walled City using photography, video, audio, text and interactive features to tell the stories of the history, environment and inhabitants.

Kowloon Walled City: Life in the City of Darkness

2013-04-18T15:57:00-04:00

Kowloon Walled City, located not far from the former Kai Tak Airport, was a remarkable high-rise squatter camp that by the 1980s had 50,000 residents. A historical accident of colonial Hong Kong, it existed in a lawless vacuum until it became an embarrassment for Britain. This month marks the 20th anniversary of its demolition.