Bringing Old Japanese-Era Houses Back to Life

Early one cold morning in late February, author Ma Guo­guang arrives at an old house where he once lived, at Qing­tian Street, Lane 7, No. 6. He is right on time for his appointment to show the house—owned by National Taiwan University, and the long-time residence of his father, well-known geologist Ma Ting-ying—to a group of history and architecture buffs.

Ma chats amiably about old times as he leads his charges on their tour. Amidst the memories, the wooden pillars seem to exude a delicate fragrance, breezes pass freely through the spacious yard, the green trees outside join with those of the neighbors into a single canopy, birds sing and insects chirp. It is like being in the woods.

Back in the day, though this house and those around it were surrounded by walls and gateways, these were built low enough that any adult could see over them, and in fact their presence lent sharper relief to the polite rituals of neighborliness that characterized those days. “My father had studied in Japan and spoke fluent Japanese. The wife of Professor Lin who lived next door was herself Japanese, and based on this connection she would occasionally come over to visit. From inside the house, the floor of which is raised up above the ground in the fashion of old Japanese houses, my father could see Mrs. Lin over the outside wall even before she got to the gate, and the two would launch into the customary pattern of bowing and formal greetings.” It was only later that high walls were built around these houses.

Heading to the other end of the yard, Ma shows the visitors elegant details of the edifice, built in a style combining Japanese and Western architectural features, while he regales them with the story of its origins. In the 1930s a group of professors from the College of Agriculture at Tai­hoku Imperial University (now National Taiwan University)—led by microbiologist Ma­sashi Ada­chi, the person who had this particular house built—pooled their funds and bought land to build their ideal community of intelligentsia. More than 30 households were arranged in orderly rows, in a community that was carefully planned for sunlight, airflow, drainage, hygiene, and even spacing between neighboring homes. The neighborhood was saturated with an ambience reflecting the intellectual liberalism of its occupants, such as the rhombic European-style window frames then in fashion, and Western living rooms for greeting guests instead of the tatami rooms typical of old-fashioned Japanese homes.

A center of culture? Or a place of business? The re-purposing of old Japanese-era houses requires careful thought on the part of both the public and private sectors. Upper photo: The dining area in Qingtian 76. Lower photo: A highly atmospheric and appealing old house on Qidong Street, currently managed by the Chinese Guqin Association.

This old domicile, where the very air is imbued with memories, was for a time abandoned to the destructive forces of nature, sealed behind locked gates. Like many other Japanese-style wooden houses on Qing­tian Street, it seemed destined to be torn down to make way for modern apartment blocks. But then the Qing­tian Community Development Association (QCDA), organized by concerned local residents, started lobbying everyone they could think of and began to unearth the rich cultural subsoil of this area and reveal its ecological value. Finally, in 2007, the Tai­pei City Government designated the area for preservation as a neighborhood with an essentially intact and coherent aesthetic appearance. A private enterprise, the Golden­seeds Education Organization (GEO), took over operation of this house and conducted and paid for renovation work. In June of 2011 the structure was reopened to the public.

Considering that this is the former residence of Ma Ying-ting, it is fitting that all three core figures behind the GEO are themselves graduates of the NTU Department of Geology. Operating without any official subsidy, they were allowed to conduct partial renovations and rename the structure—it is now called “Qing­tian 76”—and they offer guided tours by appointment as well as activities in popular science. GEO earns income from serving meals and drinks, and so far they have enjoyed a full house for virtually every meal. With this money they pay the utility bills, maintenance costs, and monthly rental to the “landlord,” NTU.

Interestingly, besides Taiwanese visitors, in the past few years some Japanese in their 80s have been spotted nostalgically wandering the Qing­tian neighborhood. QCDA member You Yun­xia, a high-school biology teacher, relates that in her efforts to probe the area’s history more deeply, she went to Japan to visit with some elderly Japanese who were actually born in Taiwan and lived as children in the Qing­tian area, then known as Showa Ward.

“At first they were very reluctant to talk about that time, about the homes they were forced to leave when they were repatriated to Japan at the end of World War II. But when I asked if they could tell me what they enjoyed and loved about the neighborhood ‘through the eyes of a child,’ they finally opened up. The more they spoke, the more enthusiastic they became, and since then some of them have come back to Tai­wan to meet with us here and exchange ideas and memories.”

In the rapidly changing urban environment, old houses and old trees have become sanctuaries for the soul, generating a comfortable vibe of human warmth. The photo shows the former residence of the late professor of geology Ma Ting-ying, whose son, the author Ma Guoguang, now volunteers as a guide for tours of the house.

According to a survey by the Tai­pei City Department of Cultural Affairs, there are about 2000 Japanese-era structures in the city, mainly in the Zhong­zheng, Zhong­shan, and Da’an districts. A small number still have people living in them and maintaining them, but the vast majority, whose residents have dwindled away, are riddled with problems—leaky ceilings, collapsing walls, termites—and are in no condition to be used.

Chang Wei-hsiu, former secretary-­general of the Organization of Urban Re-s, says that in the wake of the most recent wave of cultural preservation activism by citizens and experts, since 2004 over 70 Japanese-style structures have been designated as historic or protected sites. This “re-public-ization” of private dwellings represents a deepening of the definition of “cultural assets” in the context of architectural history. “In the past,” he explains, “respect was reserved exclusively for the palaces of princes, or structures with some particular symbolic importance. But now more attention is being devoted to the social and humanistic importance of the details of everyday life in a wider variety of dwellings.”

For example, the reasons for preserving Qi­dong Street and its Japanese-era dormitories are that the small winding lanes illustrate how the city grew outwards as it expanded from its core in ­Bangka (today’s Wan­hua) toward Kee­lung back in the Qing Dynasty, and because there are virtually no other extant examples of an entire neighborhood of Japanese structures from the late Tai­sho and early Showa eras.

There has also been a trend toward preserving the domiciles of important historical figures. Though neither grandiose nor of particular architectural importance, they offer tangible insights into how these people lived. Among those already opened to the public are the homes of Yin Hai­guang (1919–1969), a staunch advocate of a more liberal political system during the authoritarian era; Li Kwoh-ting (1910–2001), one of the key policymakers behind Taiwan’s economic development, and Pu Tian­sheng (1911–1996), a sculptor known for bronze works of iconic figures including Chiang Kai-shek, Sun Yat-sen, Zheng Cheng­gong, and Confucius. (Yin’s house is on Wen­zhou Street, Li’s on Lane 2 of Tai’an Street, and Fu’s on Lane 9 of Lin­sen North Road.)

The area around Wenzhou Street in Taipei City is packed with Japanese-era structures inherited by National Taiwan University from its predecessor, Taihoku University. One of these, the former residence of Yin Haiguang (above), a progressive thinker from the 1960s, has become a center for the spread of liberal ideas. The sea of green creates a very tranquil atmosphere.

Of course one may well wonder: What could be the appeal of these homes to the ordinary person? How can they be best managed to bring the residents and their times to life for today’s visitor?

“Through the items on display and the minutiae of everyday life, sometimes it is possible to picture to yourself the person’s intellectual development and level of cultivation, and even the way his or her thinking evolved,” suggests Pan Kuang-che, chairman of the Yin Hai­guang Memorial Foundation and an associate research fellow at the Institute of Modern History at Academia Sin­ica.

Referring to the yard outside Yin Hai­guang’s house, Pan explains that in those days Yin was under constant surveillance because of his political views, little different from being under house arrest. To get some exercise and take his mind off his worries, he shoveled out a small channel which he connected up to a nearby irrigation ditch, giving himself a small winding stream. He piled up the earth into a little mound, planted flowers and trees all around, and had a stone table and stone stools installed. Such details bring to life a man who was determined and resolute, but retained a sense of the romantic—a man who spoke truth to power.

“Of course some people come here with a sense they are visiting some kind of shrine to a saintly figure. We’ve also had some mainland Chinese exchange students here earnestly trying to confirm that things they had read in Yin’s books were true. But our point in preserving the old residence is not to freeze history, but to keep the spirit of liberalism as a living discourse in contemporary life.” To this end, last year the foundation held numerous lectures and activities, and this year plans to hold a series of contemporary seminars on liberalism in cooperation with other bastions of humanism, including Wistaria Tea House and Qingtian 76.

A center of culture? Or a place of business? The re-purposing of old Japanese-era houses requires careful thought on the part of both the public and private sectors. Upper photo: The dining area in Qingtian 76. Lower photo: A highly atmospheric and appealing old house on Qidong Street, currently managed by the Chinese Guqin Association.

The Japanese-style residential compound at Qi­dong Street, Lane 53, No. 11, is likewise managed by a non-profit organization: For the past six months, the Department of Cultural Affairs has commissioned the Chinese Gu­qin Association to operate the site on a trial basis. The result has been the creation of an elegant little oasis in the urban desert.

Association chairman Yuan Zhong­ping, a professor of ethnomusicology at Nan­hua University, explains that the gu­qin is China’s most ancient plucked string instrument. It has a deep, rich tone and an elegant, far-reaching resonance. Though very much a deep-rooted symbol of Asian culture, today its practice has become an art form appreciated by only a select few. “The main point in operating the venue is to put cultural textures on display, not to court popularity or pack the place to the rafters.”

Nonetheless, when the association invited nine performers to hold a concert of works by 10 modern gu­qin composers, it demonstrated how successful they have been at setting down roots. “That day we only put out chairs for 30 paying visitors, but we got 80! What a rare confluence of conditions it was that day: everyone crowded in in the warm winter sunshine, entranced by the playing of the guqin, with the sounds outside of birds singing and the breeze soughing through the trees complementing the music beautifully,” says Yuan, his expression showing what a sublime day it must have been.

But it must be said that in taking over the space the association has also taken on very practical challenges. For example, it was only after moving in that they found out that there was construction work going on next door virtually every day. “We try to keep on friendly terms with them, so that we can ask them to halt work temporarily when we have a performance.”

In the rapidly changing urban environment, old houses and old trees have become sanctuaries for the soul, generating a comfortable vibe of human warmth. The photo shows the former residence of the late professor of geology Ma Ting-ying, whose son, the author Ma Guoguang, now volunteers as a guide for tours of the house.

In the absence of substantive policy support from any government agencies, many Japanese-era structures depend for their survival on the creativity and enthusiasm of private citizens.

This can be seen very clearly in the case of the roughly 150 Japanese-era houses owned by National Taiwan University. The university was put in a quandary when Tai­pei City designated some of them as historic sites, making it illegal to remove them and saddling NTU with responsibility for heavy maintenance bills they couldn’t hope to meet. In 2009 NTU’s General Affairs Office came up with a “build, operate, transfer” (BOT) mechanism for these buildings, under which the school has opened up their management and use to the private sector, with the occupants for any given structure to be decided by experts through a process of online bidding and proposals. The winning business establishes its premises in the old structure for a contracted period, and agrees to handle and fund all building renovation and maintenance. Lease periods for buildings that are currently in good shape are shorter (as little as two years), while those for structures in poor condition run for correspondingly longer periods (up to nine years). Qing­tian 76 is one of the structures that today operates under this program.

General affairs director Zhang Fu­shu admits that NTU’s motivation in recruiting the private sector to adopt old structures is financial—his budget does not reach to the exorbitant renovation and maintenance costs—but he notes that the school has no comprehensive policy in place to repurpose the buildings.

The first example of a successful BOT project for an NTU-owned Japanese-era building to be renovated and opened to the public lies in a high-rent neighborhood right across the street from the Xin­sheng South Road gate to the campus.

Businessman David Pao made the choice in middle age to give up his career and open a coffee shop. When he made his proposal to NTU to take over the old structure, he had just closed up his old shop. He has a fondness for old buildings because “you can sense they have been through good times and bad, and they bear the marks and scars of time.” His proposal—selected over those of 17 competitors, including a sporting goods store, a hot-pot restaurant, and a well-known hamburger chain—included a very detailed plan of the changes he would make to the space.

Today, the shop, though only about 100 square meters in size, lacking any outside sign, and having only a few seats for customers, has become an eye-catching landmark outside the school gate. When Pao renovated the house, he kept only the pillars and beams, and the Japanese-style tiled roof. The interior walls were removed and the exterior wall facing the street was entirely replaced with clear glass. Interior mirrors create the illusion of a much larger space. The shop is especially attractive at night, when warm lighting bathes passing pedestrians and motorists in an atmosphere of warmth and comfort.

Though commercial, the structure retains an air of learning and cultivation. Pao says that besides NTU students and faculty, he also gets a lot of people who make their living in the arts and culture. He mentions with a laugh, “We only serve coffee, but that doesn’t seem to bother them. They hang around all day without ever apparently needing to eat!”

The refurbishing of old houses puts a fresh new face on the city. David Pao (right), the owner of Drop Coffee House, located in a renovated Japanese-era structure on Xinsheng South Road, loves to observe the crowds strolling by outside. Looking into the shop also feels very much like watching live theater.

As with all old buildings that get “upgraded” to “cultural assets,” there are difficult issues regarding how to best manage these structures and keep them financially viable while ensuring they do not lose their cultural significance. These issues test the mettle of both the government agencies charged with adminstering the relevant legislation, and the entities that take on the structures’ management.

Chang Wei-hsiu points out that although the prevailing law in this area, the Cultural Heritage Preservation Act, makes “managing entities” responsible for maintaining designated protected sites, it provides no powers of enforcement, and no overarching planning vision to guide their operation and management. As a result, the cases of revitalization of these old structures that have caught the attention of the public have in fact all been done by non-governmental actors, mainly commercial operators.

Chang speaks for many who are dubious about the slippery slope toward mass commercialization of Japanese-era cultural assets: “Can’t we come up with any alternative to turning these old buildings into restaurants and coffee shops?”

You Yun­xia, one of the driving forces for preservation around Qing­tian Street, hopes NTU will take a more proactive role in putting these houses to academic or cultural uses. “As Taiwan’s leading intellectual center, with a unique history spanning the Japanese and ROC eras, the university could reclaim the academic ambience this settlement of scholars once had, and redefine the history of both the school and the city. At the same time, they can use these geographic resources to create a model community built around new ways of thinking about the living environment, culture, and quality of life.”

The fact that people are now thinking about such questions shows that the social movement for preserving cultural assets is moving beyond mere “firefighting” (saving buildings from destruction) toward solving the issues of systematic, sustainable management. One can only hope that more people will contribute their ideas to this ongoing dialogue between human residents and urban spaces.

The area around Wenzhou Street in Taipei City is packed with Japanese-era structures inherited by National Taiwan University from its predecessor, Taihoku University. One of these, the former residence of Yin Haiguang (above), a progressive thinker from the 1960s, has become a center for the spread of liberal ideas. The sea of green creates a very tranquil atmosphere.