Once the Guangzhou Concession, it has now become a famous scenic spot in online celebrity and is also known as the European Architecture Museum.
Historically, Shamian Island was not an island, but a desolate sandbar formed by alluvial when the Pearl River water rushed to the sea and still connected with the land, named Shicuizhou.
Shicuizhou is small, with an area of only .3 square kilometers, but it has been an important business center in Guangzhou since ancient times. Since the Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties, Shicuizhou, together with the nearby "Shangxiajiu", has formed an important cargo trading center in the southeast coast of China, where countless goods have been exchanged and transshipped, thus shouldering the trade burden of Guangzhou. In the Ming Dynasty, Huajie Pavilion was also set up here to manage the import and export of foreign goods. This shows how prosperous Shicuizhou was at that time.
But after the Opium War, everything changed. In 1859, Britain and France set their eyes on this treasure trove of geomantic omen, and they sent the official British representative "Burke" to negotiate with the Qing government, forcing the Qing government to dig a small creek (Shajiyong) with a width of 4 meters and a length of more than 1,2 meters in the north of Shicuizhou, making it an island called Shamian Island. Later, the Qing government was forced to sign the Treaty of Shamian Concession, which forcibly plundered the right to use Shamian Island and forced Shamian Island to become a concession.
subsequently, they began to build a large number of western-style buildings on it, including churches, schools, post offices, hospitals, clubs, etc. for the use of people on the island. In the decades after signing the lease treaty, the public facilities on Shamian Island have been gradually improved, and a large number of foreign firms have been attracted, including Swire, Mitsubishi, HSBC and Standard Chartered Bank.
At that time, besides Britain and France, there were Dutch consulates, Soviet consulates, American consulates, etc., so the buildings on the island were various and varied, covering the styles of European countries. There are both new baroque trendy buildings, classical buildings imitating Gothic style, and coupon-gallery buildings in Rome, etc. However, generally speaking, the buildings inside are mainly English and French buildings, which belong to typical western classical buildings.
such distinctive and concentrated western-style buildings are unique among more than 3 concession areas in history. Even the Italian Style Street in Tianjin, the Bund in Shanghai and Badaguan in Qingdao have no typical architectural style of sand surface. Therefore, Shamian is also known as an open-air European museum. It is suggested that friends who like European architecture must come and have a look. The European architecture with various styles here will surely feast their eyes.
Later, after years of changes, the European architecture on Shamian Island also showed an old state. The refuting walls, the falling walls and the overgrown old trees are all silently telling the forgotten history. Once, Shamian Island, as a British-French concession, really witnessed the decline of the Qing Dynasty, but now it has become a national key historical relics protection area. These European-style buildings, which have witnessed the history, have been revitalized in a new way and become a famous tourist destination.
Last year, Guangzhou spent 35 million yuan, which lasted for four months, to renovate the buildings on this small island. The newly-built pavement has been widened a lot, green plants have been filled in, the walls have been repaired again, and the interiors of some buildings have been repaired. Many public facilities have been added to the roadside to facilitate tourists to rest. Shamian Island, which has a history of hundreds of years, has taken on a new look and become more beautiful.
Shamian Island * * * has more than 15 European buildings with different styles, each with its own unique characteristics, which is most suitable for hanging out and punching cards. This exotic area is also the place with the highest rate of wedding photos. On weekends or holidays, tourists who take photos and punch in are bustling, injecting a fresh vitality into the sand surface and becoming a online celebrity attraction in Guangzhou.
The ancient European architecture, the mossy old trees are reborn in the people coming and going, but after you come here, you can still find peace from these mottled sunshine, as if you have traveled through time and space and returned to the old days.
Shamian Island, unlike other scenic spots, does not have a large number of shops to visit, but there are also many online celebrity shops in the periphery. For example, Starbucks, which is praised as the most beautiful in Guangzhou, is painted with a bright layer of Tiffany green, attracting a large number of tourists to punch in and take photos. It's really comfortable to order a cup of coffee here and choose a window seat to be in a daze.
Even McDonald's, which has always been lively, has changed its old style and turned into a European retro style after entering Shamian. The huge yellow logo is embedded in the pure white exterior wall, with a lively and proper ins style in a low-key manner. It is definitely a large treasure shop.
Shamian Island used to be a witness to the humiliation of the Opium War. After a hundred years of renting out, after the new China became powerful, it turned into an evidence for us to look back at history, whipping us forward all the time. Nowadays, the sand surface that has witnessed more than 15 years of historical changes has become a proper place to take pictures and a good place to relax.
The great changes in the next 15 years will still be witnessed by Sha Mian, but in another way.