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Travel in Shanghai The Shikumen Open House Museum
| The Shikumen Open House Museum |
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 Wulixiang For every Shanghai resident, the word "Wulixiang" warms the heart. Over 70% of Shanghai residents were born and raised in Shikumen houses. However, Shikumen are now fast disappearing. The Shikumen "Wulixiang" Exhibition Hall in Xintiandi offers us a chance to cherish the memories of old Shanghai and recall past events.  The Exhibition Hall is in a renovated Shikumen house built in the 1920s. It covers a floor space of 367.2 square metres and a gross floor area of 513.9 square metres. It is constructed in the architectural style of the 1920s and is modelled on one household, which was part of a unit in an alley. There are seven exhibition rooms: the sitting room(fig 2), the study(fig 3), the elderly people's room, the master bedroom(fig 4), the daughter's room(fig 5), the son's room and the kitchen(fig 6). As well as showing how a typical family lived in Shanghai in the 1920s, the exhibition also illustrates the concepts of the Xintiandi project and its renovation and development process. All the articles on display in the Exhibition Hall, whether cooking ranges or children's textbooks, lipsticks or ashtrays, are all genuine 1920s or 1930s memorabilia sourced in the Shikumen alleys. Sitting at the dressing table in the master bedroom(fig 4) on the second floor, fiddling with the exquisite "Baiqueling" rouge and a hair clasp inlaid with a green jade, while listening to lively Jazz music from the nearby gramophone, you can easily imagine the lifestyle of a middle class lady in the 1930s. In her daughter's room(fig 5) are English magazines with photos of Hollywood stars of that era and an old sewing machine, all of which suggest the daughter was a fashionable young woman.The multi-media, sound effects and indoor projector at various exhibition points help make the trip back to Shikumen in the 1920s and 1930s even easier.  All the articles on display in the Exhibition Hall, whether cooking ranges or children's textbooks, lipsticks or ashtrays, are all genuine 1920s or 1930s memorabilia sourced in the Shikumen alleys. Sitting at the dressing table in the master bedroom(fig 4) on the second floor, fiddling with the exquisite "Baiqueling" rouge and a hair clasp inlaid with a green jade, while listening to lively Jazz music from the nearby gramophone, you can easily imagine the lifestyle of a middle class lady in the 1930s. In her daughter's room(fig 5) are English magazines with photos of Hollywood stars of that era and an old sewing machine, all of which suggest the daughter was a fashionable young woman. The multi-media, sound effects and indoor projector at various exhibition points help make the trip back to Shikumen in the 1920s and 1930s even easier.  "Tingzijian(fig 8)" is the name of a small room located at the turn of the staircase in a building. It usually faces the north, so the small room would be cold in winter and hot in summer. House owners used to rent them out for extra income. During the 1920s and 1930s, many highly educated people and artists came to Shanghai to escape social and political unrest in other parts of China. Many of them were single and Tingzijian(fig 8) was to them a cheap, convenient form of accommodation. In these humble rooms, they studied arduously and wrote prodigiously. Many famous writers such as Lu Xun, Cai Yuanpei, Guo Moluo, Mao Dun, Ba Jing, Ding Ling and Feng Zikai had lived in Tingzijian. Many of their works reflected life in Tingzijian and Shikumen, and were hence dubbed  "Tingzijian Literature". Opening hours: 11:00am-23:00pm Tel: (8621) 33070337 E-mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it No.25, Lane181 Taicang Lu, Xin Tian Di, near Madang Lu, Metro Line 1 Huangpi Nan Lu Station
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