Buildings of Beijing

This is the 2nd part of my China miniseries. Wherever I go, I ´m always interested to see how people actually live. How have the buildings been designed, especially the older buildings, built 30-40 years ago. When you´re thinking of a city that has 22m people, the urban planning becomes so important.

Most older buildings we saw had at least 10-12 floors, the newer ones were 20-25 floors high, made more of glass and steel than concrete. Most photos I took were while being in a taxi.

Beijing has several glass and steel skyscrapers, both for residences and offices - but I focused on the older buildings. They are what, in my eyes, have character.

There were many over passes with elevators for pedestrians, cutting across the city traffic.

The below was called the Galaxy Soho building, it was not a residential building, but a business park. Also, the dedicated 2-wheeler lane was very cool!

Some areas had so many residential buildings, it was like a sea of buildings. Imagining how many people live in this city, it´s not hard to understand why so many buildings sprang up all over the city.

I really liked the below building; the design spelled more class. In a city like Beijing, when you see a villa or a low-rise building, you can imagine how expensive the apartment would be.

This was a highly zoomed-in photo, a sea of buildings. Low-rise, medium-rise, high-rise, old, new - the below photo has it all.

There were some areas that were ear-marked to be preserved by the government, to avoid gentrification. I hope the next time I go; I can still walk the inner lanes and see my favorite hutongs. Built during the Yuan, Ming, and Qing dynasties, the Beijing Hutongs are filled with houses located around a square courtyard where the inhabitants lead a traditional life anchored in the past. That´s my next post!