China Baptist Publication Society Building - Shanghai - 1930
Yuen Ming Yuen Rd, Shanghai.
Looking like something out of Gotham City, this singularly unecclesiastical building housed the China Baptist Publication Society as well as offices, warehouse and retail space. Ever since China opened up to foreigners in the 1850s, as well as traders seeking to make a quick buck, Christian missionaries descended on what was perceived to be fertile ground intending to convert the masses. Shanghai became the headquarters for various Christian groups in China and where pious collided with the avaricious in a saints and sinners world.
This was yet another building designed by the prolific architect Ladislav Hudec who had his office on the 8th floor of this building. He had returned from the USA, drawing artistic inspiration from similar buildings in Chicago and New York in a style known as Gothic Art Deco.
Ladislav Hudec was a Hungarian who designed some of Shanghai's most memorable buildings from 1919 to 1945. Educated in Budapest, Hudec joined the Austro-Hungarian Army at the outbreak of WWI. He was later captured by the Russians in 1916 and sent to a prisoner-of-war camp in Siberia. It was from here, during the turbulent years post-1917 Bolshevik Revolution, that Hudec joined other PoWs and White Russians in their voyage eastwards to the safety of Shanghai. Hudec's style was to change over the years but his contribution to Shanghai's architecture cannot be underestimated.
China Baptist Publication Society Building - Shanghai - 1930
Yuen Ming Yuen Rd, Shanghai.
Looking like something out of Gotham City, this singularly unecclesiastical building housed the China Baptist Publication Society as well as offices, warehouse and retail space. Ever since China opened up to foreigners in the 1850s, as well as traders seeking to make a quick buck, Christian missionaries descended on what was perceived to be fertile ground intending to convert the masses. Shanghai became the headquarters for various Christian groups in China and where pious collided with the avaricious in a saints and sinners world.
This was yet another building designed by the prolific architect Ladislav Hudec who had his office on the 8th floor of this building. He had returned from the USA, drawing artistic inspiration from similar buildings in Chicago and New York in a style known as Gothic Art Deco.
Ladislav Hudec was a Hungarian who designed some of Shanghai's most memorable buildings from 1919 to 1945. Educated in Budapest, Hudec joined the Austro-Hungarian Army at the outbreak of WWI. He was later captured by the Russians in 1916 and sent to a prisoner-of-war camp in Siberia. It was from here, during the turbulent years post-1917 Bolshevik Revolution, that Hudec joined other PoWs and White Russians in their voyage eastwards to the safety of Shanghai. Hudec's style was to change over the years but his contribution to Shanghai's architecture cannot be underestimated.