When Hong Kong ’s Kowloon Walled City was raze in the tardy 1980s , it was an infamously unassailable oasis for drugs , crime , and prostitution — a place few locals would dare to chatter . Now , a theme park outside of Tokyo is selling tickets to explore a painstakingly mold replication of the Walled City — the right way down to its glass , which was imported from Hong Kong .
We ’ve write about the history of the Walled Citybefore — itwould’ve been 20 this year — but if if you ’re not conversant with it , here ’s a abbreviated primer . After changing hand between the UK , China , and Japan for nearly a C , the site became a kind of nester ’s haven in the 1960s , when several hundred makeshift towers slowly flux into a single social organisation , rumple together by makeshift walkway and plumbing . At its peak , it was home to almost 33,000 people , boasting everything from botcher and tooth doctor to daycare centers and casino .
https://gizmodo.com/kowloon-walled-city-remembering-hong-kongs-chaotic-cit-5995070
Image byGreg Girard .
There ’s dissension about the legacy of the Walled City — some debate it was a function community where citizens collaborated to keep each other safe , while others claim it was a haven for crime . In reality , it was credibly a routine of both — but either room , it was permanently inscribed into the corporate awareness by authors like William Gibson and video game like Kowloon ’s Gate . And the summit ( or low-water mark ) of that obsession ? Anata no Warehouse , an colonnade and amusement park located between located just between Tokyo and Yokohama , which boasts an astonishingly realistic recreation of the Walled City .
Inside this eight - story storage warehouse , which was give in 2009 , visitors are treated to a recreation of the Walled City that boundary line on obsessive . The room decorator based their employment on the few photos that exist of the literal Walled City . Each sign was hand - lettered and break by a Hong Kong native , while each storefront is found on the ones see inthis uncommon TV footageof the real Walled City . There ’s even a faux - brothel , where a nude mannequin lies inside a reddish - illuminated elbow room .
https://gizmodo.com/incredible-claustrophobic-footage-from-inside-the-kowlo-5713565
Every detail — right down to the trash — was the issue of an strict vetting process . Taishiro Hoshino , a set graphic designer that make for on the projection , write that the team sent aside to Hong Kong for authentic tin mailbox and garbage . “ The drivel left on the butcher ’s collapsible shelter and the tin roof are also indispensable in reproducing Kowloon Walled City , ” hesays . “ I insist on using the genuine clause and ask my friend and her family in Hong Kong to beam a box of their house scraps all the way to Japan . ”
Despite the exacting faithfulness to history , there are some tells , too — like air conditioning , for one thing . And , according toRandomwire‘s David Gilbert , some very modern Nipponese bath hidden beneath a cautiously detailed veneer of rust fungus . “ The juxtaposition of a high - technical school Nipponese stool in an genuinely grimy toilet has to be view to be consider , ” he writes .
So why would visitors — even those who are fan of the fictional interpretation of Kowloon — confab such a place ? In fact , the principal magnet is a gaming center that offers all manner of betting and arcade games , plus an net cafe . The historical Kowloon replica , it seems , is just an starter for the innovative principal form .
For more on the warehouse , check out David Gilbert ’s blog post about his visithereand his images onFlickr .
Images by David Gilbert onFlickr .
Japan
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