Title: Disappearing City
Site: Changsha Hisense Mall
Synopsis
The shopping mall is a representative scene of daily life, from which we can see people’s lifestyles and the characteristics of a city. I choose a special shopping mall, Changsha Hisense Mall, as the site for my fieldwork. The mall can be separated into two parts, one part is the ordinary modern shopping mall, and the other part is Changsha Wenheyou. Changsha Wenheyou has 7 floors, covering an area of 20,000 square meters. The decoration here is all designed in accordance with the style of the 1980s and 1990s. And it restores a 300-meter-long street using hundreds of thousands of old buildings and daily belongings collected, to represent a complete past living place, a disappearing place of living. As for the design of the building, although Wenheyou is an indoor building, it moved the old street in and made it feel like shopping outdoors. It looks shabby and densely built, but it’s full of life. To some extent, it is an excavator of urban stories, which presents a disappearing urban story in a specific scene in the form of architecture, food, and culture. Now Wenheyou becomes a new landmark in Changsha and receives tens of millions of consumers every year. Wen’s popularity also reflects citizens’ nostalgia for old streets as well as the relatively slow-paced life. With the acceleration of urbanization, the cityscapes in memory are gone, people’s way of life is changing, and some of the city features are gradually disappearing.
The Making of the Video
When shooting “Forever Street”, I moved the camera horizontally along with my steps in order to simulate the real shopping and give the audience a sense of immersive. And when photographing the appearance of the mall, I used a long shot to present its modernization and large footprint. There is a clip of Chang sha Wenheyou shot from top down to show it in its entirety and give the impression of the whole. Besides, I really like the clip where I opened an ordinary door from the mall and walked into Wenheyou, as if I had suddenly entered another world. I happened to do this two years ago, and it leaves me with a deep impression. That’s why I chose here to shoot my video.
Reflection
Urban characteristics have rich connotations and are important elements to show the charm of the city. However, it can be shown from the contrast of the two separate parts of Hisense Mall that in the process of urbanization, some of Changsha’s urban characteristics are disappearing. Not only does Changsha faces this problem. it is worrying that in the rapid wave of urbanization, many cities are undergoing a man-made and rapid reshaping. The heterogeneity given by the history and culture of many historic cities is now gradually being replaced by similar high-rise buildings and the same neighborhoods. In today’s accelerated development of urbanization in China, how to protect, continue and innovate urban characteristics is a common problem faced by urban planners.
On the other hand, the success of Wenheyou’s business model reflects people’s demand for reviewing urban memory and remodeling urban culture, and provides a useful reference for solving the problem mentioned above. As for the interrelationship between people and their physical surroundings, there exists a relation called place attachment, which refers to bonds that people develop with places. Through the protection of typical cityscapes and the excavation of urban memory, we can strengthen citizens’ sense of identity and cohesiveness, thus shaping the spirit and culture of the city. How to realize the coexistence and integrated development of the ‘old’ and ‘new’ cityscapes? I expect more possibilities in the future.
Transcript
This is Changsha Hisense Mall.
The mall can be separated into two parts, one part is the ordinary modern shopping mall, and the other part is Changsha Wenheyou.
Wenheyou has 7 floors, covering an area of 20,000 square meters. The decoration here is all designed in accordance with the style of the 1980s and 1990s. And it restores a 300-meter-long street using hundreds of thousands of old buildings and daily belongings collected, to represent a complete past living place, a disappearing place of living.
On the 3rd and 4th floor, it restored an old street that had disappeared – Forever Street, bringing together more than 30 classic Changsha snack bars. Many of them were moved into Wenheyou after the demolition of their original streets. It looks shabby and densely built, but it’s full of life.
With the progress of the city reconstruction, many horizontal streets disappeared into vertical buildings. And high homogenization has become a common problem in some shopping malls. People went to different cities and ended up visiting the same shops.
It can be shown from the contrast of t
he two separate parts of Hisense Mall that in the process of urbanization, some of Changsha’s urban characteristics are disappearing. It is worrying that in the rapid wave of urbanization, many cities are undergoing a man-made and rapid reshaping. The heterogeneity given by the history and culture of many historic cities is now gradually being replaced by similar high-rise buildings and the same neighborhoods.
In today’s accelerated development of urbanization, how to protect, continue and innovate urban characteristics is a common problem faced by urban planners.
Director: Chen Yudan
Voiceover: Chen Yudan
*All the video clips and pictures are original content
Reference / Inspiration
Been, Vicki, Ingrid Gould Ellen, Michael Gedal, Edward Glaeser, and Brian J. McCabe. “Preserving history or restricting development? The heterogeneous effects of historic districts on local housing markets in New York City.” Journal of Urban Economics 92 (2016): 16-30.
Guan, Xingliang, Houkai Wei, Shasha Lu, Qi Dai, and Hongjian Su. “Assessment on the urbanization strategy in China: Achievements, challenges and reflections.” Habitat International 71 (2018): 97-109.
Huang Shi. “The dilemma of historical and modernity in urban construction”. Urban Management 4 (2007).
Labbé, Delphine, Tiiu Poldma, Catherine Fichten, Alice Havel, Eva Kehayia, Barbara Mazer, Patricia McKinley, Annie Rochette, and Bonnie Swaine. “Rehabilitation in the real-life environment of a shopping mall.” Disability and rehabilitation 40, no. 7 (2018): 848-855.
Ünlü, Tülin Selvi. “Kent Kimliğinin Oluşumunda Kentsel Bellek ve Kentsel Mekan İlişkisi: Mersin Örneği The Relation Between Urban Memory and Urban Space on Evolution of Urban Character: Case of Mersin.” Planlama 27, no. 1 (2017): 75-93.
Wang, F., Peng, Y., Wang, H.C. and Yin, F. (2016), “Old walls, modern city: research on urban memory of disappearing ancient Beijing city walls”, International Journal of Tourism Cities, Vol. 2 No. 1, pp. 29-44. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJTC-11-2015-0029
Yang Mei, Qiu Canhong. “Looking for Urban Characteristics – Urban Development and Characteristic Protection”. Chinese and Foreign Architecture 11 (2010).
Wang Yiming, “文和友：一家为城市文化而生的’超级餐厅’”, Tencent News, October 26, 2021, https://view.inews.qq.com/a/20211026A02CYL00
“文和友，一个靠讲城市故事而发财的超级’盲盒’”, Baidu, last modified September 13,2012, https://baijiahao.baidu.com/s?id=1710772447161017254&wfr=spider&for=pc&searchword=
“在长沙，有个不断创造的’超级文和友’”, Tencent_isux , December 28, 2019,https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/VA6pKuIgXQkhDwsWWmDgQQ
Chen Yudan 3035844601
I really like your rewind effect in the introduction. It successfully shows both the traditional and modern sides of Hisense Hall and it is like bringing us back to the old times in China. I think you have also used a slow-motion effect at the end of the video to indicate that these kinds of traditional streets are disappearing under urbanization. Moreover, it reminds me of the setting used in Ip Man, which is similar to the streets shown in the video. I am wondering if you have any recommended films that have similar settings to the street you showed here.
Thanks for your comment! I am sorry that I cannot recall a movie that has similar settings.☹️