HUDEC'S legacy

If the Peace Hotel is a gigantic ship loaded with memories, the Normandie Apartments on Huaihai Road is another.

I live near the Normandie Apartments and enjoy crossing through its graceful arcade going to and from Huaihai Road. My late grandmother, Christina Yu, had her hair styled in the early 1950s with her friend at one of its arcade shops, named “Violet.”

To the Shanghai netizens who voted for the city’s “99 Shanghai symbols,” it was one of two Hudec buildings voted as “reasons to love Shanghai.” The other was the Park Hotel.

Of the 99 symbols, Hudec was the only foreigner to appear.

Famous Beijing journalist Wang Jun once asked me “Why does Shanghai love him and what’s behind ‘Hudec fever’?”

Renowned for his best-selling “Beijing Record” and long-time devotion to heritage preservation in the capital city, Wang took an interest in the European architect, who is relatively unknown in Beijing but adored by his Shanghai friends.

“Hudec’s old Shanghai,” a forum on China’s leading cultural website Douban.com, has attracted more than 2,600 “Hudec fans.” Known as wu fen, a Chinese abbreviation for Hudec fan, they visit his buildings regularly and exchange their findings.

Born in today’s Banska Bystrica, Slovakia, during the Austro-Hungarian monarchy in 1893, Hudec was enlisted to fight during World War I and was caught by the Russian army and sent to a Siberian prison. In 1918 while being transferred, Hudec jumped from a train near the Chinese border and fled to Shanghai.

This architectural graduate started his own architectural firm in 1925 and went on to design 53 projects including Park Hotel and the Grand Theatre.

But after he left for Switzerland in 1947, this once famous name was nearly forgotten until 2008, when the Hungarian Consulate General in Shanghai and local government launched the Year of Hudec.

The widely reported, yearlong event fired public interest in this architect and the city’s architectural heritage. Hudec’s quickly soaring fame is regarded by local scholars as a cultural phenomenon and has been dubbed “Hudec fever.”

Today nearly half of Hudec’s buildings are still used for their original function, which is good for preservation.

In Hudec’s buildings today, one can rent a room for a night, enjoy a movie or pray. More Hudec works have opened to the public after renovations.

After revisiting 13 Hudec projects for this column, I can finally answer Wang’s question. Hudec’s buildings have stood the test of time and are not dusty old museums. They contain many memories, and at the same time, create fresh ones every day.

It was such a journey, during which I received feedback from both expatriate and Chinese readers. The latter had enjoyed reading a bilingual WeChat version of these columns.

But now it’s time to say goodbye and I end this series with the Normandie Apartments.

I’d like to add that Shanghai's fascinating architecture is the work of many expat and Chinese architects. Hudec stands out from the crowd, but he didn’t build everything in the city. I will turn my attention to other noteworthy architects in the future.

Prepare for a new series in May. I’m not giving out any hints so everyone can try and guess what it will about.

LASZLO Hudec designed for two influential banking institutions in old Shanghai — the Joint Savings Society (JSS), owner of the Park Hotel, and the International Savings Society (ISS) that invested in building the Normandie Apartments.

The two masterpieces were both listed in the 99 symbols as “reasons for loving Shanghai” last year when Hudec was voted as a “Shanghai Symbol” by a million Shanghai netizans. Among them, the Normandie Apartments are considered an architectural treasure and still looks modern today.

“The Normandie Apartments was Hudec’s signature work when working with the American firm R.A. Curry. It was called the ‘little Flatiron’ in reference to the famous New York skyscraper,” says Italian architectural historian Luca Poncellini, author of a biography about Hudec.

The International Savings Society was founded in Shanghai in 1912 by several French merchants including Jean Beudin, whose residence on Fenyang Road was also designed by Hudec.

According to the book “Men of Shanghai and North China” published in 1933, Paris-born Beudin arrived in Shanghai on September 6, 1908 and until 1912, when the International Savings Society was started, was a partner in the firm of Cohen & J. Beudin. He had military service with the 16th Regiment of Colonial Infantry. He is a “Chevalier of the Legion of Honour.”

With its hugely successful lottery-linked deposit account, bank accounts soared from 191 in 1914 to 131,800 in 1934, according to Wu Zhiwei, a historian with the Shanghai History Museum.

“In 1934 the society’s savings deposits accounted for more than one-fifth of all savings in China. They then invested the money in bonds, foreign currencies and real estate, including the Picardie Apartments (today’s Hengshan Picardie Hotel), the Gascogne Apartments and the Normandie Apartments,” Wu says.

The building’s name has frequently led to speculation about its origin. Many people have assumed it had something to do with the D-Day Battle of Normandy during World War II, but that’s impossible since it was built 20 years before that fateful day.

Shanghai Tongji University associate professor Hua Xiahong, co-author of “Shanghai Hudec Architecture,” says the truth was closer to home.

“Fonciere et Immobillere de Chine, the real estate developer owned by the International Savings Society, had named all their apartment buildings with names from French regions, such as Picardie Apartments, Beam Apartments (Shanghai Women’s Department Store) and Savoy Apartments (Ruihua Apartments),” Hua says.

The Normandie Apartments are in a great location and the building stands out in the area. The triangle lot is located at the intersection of five streets and provides an open view. The steep, sharp-headed building suits the peculiar shape of the plot and its appearance symbolizes a flat-iron or powerful warship.

The eight-story building has a French Renaissance style and is known as the first in Shanghai to have balconies.

The external walls on the ground and second floors are coated with artificial stones while the floors above feature red bricks. An ashlar surfaced on the top floor corresponds with the base. The cantilevering balconies and the parapets form eaves with double parallel corners. The three sections of balconies form a vivid waistline on the facade.

Hua says other noteworthy architectural details include the carved stones in every arch of the ground floor, the vase-shaped stone balusters on the balconies and the classical pediments on the window lintels.

Hudec also receives high marks for designing two entrances on the northern façade on Route Ferguson (today’s Wukang Road) to let in more light and air into the rooms.

A 1920s English newspaper describes the building: “(It) contains 60 apartments, some with only one room besides kitchen and bath and others with hall, two bedrooms, living rooms, dining room, kitchen, etc, more in keeping with a family apartment.”

It also has three elevators and several fire staircases. The two elevators in the entrance hall still show the floor number with pointers.

The newspaper adds: “Besides being of fire-proof construction a special fire-proof system makes the building independent of outside assistance in case of fire, there being five hydrants, sufficient to reach every part of the building, and on the roof is a tank of 5,000 gallons of water in case the city mains should not prove adequate to the demand. An arcade of shops on the ground floor is an additional feature.”

Historian Wu says the building was one of the city’s earliest high-end apartments and was initially leased to senior employees of foreign companies such as Siemens.

“During World War II, two thirds of the rooms were empty because the former tenants, mostly Britons and Americans, had either returned home or were put into camps by the Japanese army.”

After the war, the Kuomintang government purchased the International Savings Society’s properties around 1946. Senior Kuomintang official Zhao Zukang, mayor of Shanghai before October 1949, lived in one of the building’s suites. Famous Chinese artists including actor Zhao Dan and actress Qing Yi also lived in the building at one time.

Route Ferguson was renamed Wukang Road in 1943 and the Normandie Apartments became known at the Wukang Building in 1953.

During the “cultural revolution” (1966-76), this building earned the unfortunate moniker “The Shanghai Diving Pool.” As one of the few highrise buildings in western Shanghai, a number of people ended their lives by jumping off of it.

The building was renovated years ago along with Wukang Road, which was named a National Historical Street in 2011.

Shanghai-based Zhang Ming Architectural Design Firm, which has renovated Hudec’s Grand Theatre and Moore Memorial Church, was tasked with the project.

The firm cleaned the façade, restored the brickwork and designed nice frames to hide the air conditioners. The signature arcade and the well-designed entrance hall have both been restored.

Professor Hua says Hudec had designed at least two other projects for the International Savings Society, including its headquarters on Avenue Edward VII (which was demolished when the Yan’an Elevated Road was built) and 22 residences on Rue Ratard (today’s Julu Road).

Compared with the Normandie Apartments, the 22 American-style residences in the shape of a big “L” are hidden down lanes and are relatively unknown.

“As the Rue Ratard project was one of Hudec’s earliest commissions in Shanghai, he was sending detailed sketches and descriptions on the back of some hand-made postcards to his father, plus some small photographs,” says Poncellini, who had discovered a postcard dated April 1920.

It showed 22 villas with detailed explanations in the accompanying text. He also found many family letters filled with complaints by Hudec about his early Shanghai career.

“I won’t be a real architect in Shanghai as I had imagined at the Technical University, although I build more than I would ever have thought ... Now, when with a move­ment of the pencil I direct thousands, I don’t feel the same inner peace as when I drew those little chapels ... The professionals around here have a concep­tion of architecture like the average mason at home. Architects that have graduated from university have no idea what the Baroque is, so how can you talk about the pictorial style with them? Alright, a talented person does not need to know art his­tory, they make art history, and they are talented in copying but they cannot find the appropriate proportions even by mistake,” Hudec wrote in one letter.

The “flatiron” edifice looks like a delicate, sophisticated mini city with so many long, zigzagging passageways.

It is quiet but filled with traces of life. Each long passageway seems to be a gallery exhibiting a distinct Shanghai way of life. There are big potted green plants, motorbikes covered by worn raincoats, an antique Chinese table and a rainbow of clothes hanging on a bamboo pole. Hudec’s choice of a beige-toned mezzanine floor has endured and still looks nice.

At dusk on a spring day, a dash of yellow light leaks from one of the top-floor windows. The warmth and depth of this magical city can be felt at moments like this.

The Normandie Apartments proudly and properly stand at the intersection of Huaihai and Wukang roads.

More than 90 years ago, a homesick Hudec drew blueprints for this elegant building. Did he know it was destined to become a symbol of Shanghai one day?