Half of the old houses of architect Zhu Qizhao were rented out and the cultural relics were seriously damaged

On October 31, 2015, Mr. Zhu Qizhao, a famous architect in China in the last century, bought the No. 3 Courtyard of Zhao Tangzi Hutong in Dongcheng District in the 1930s and presided over the construction of this residence himself. Now, it is a cultural relics protection unit in Dongcheng District. However, years of private construction and house rental have long lost the style of the house. Some cultural protection enthusiasts appealed for proper repair and preservation of this old Beijing courtyard.

Zhu Qizhao's old mansion

Zhao Tangzi Hutong No. 3 Courtyard, located on the southeast side of the intersection of Chaoyangmen South Small Street and Jinbao Street, the whole courtyard was about 3,000 square meters when Zhu Qizhao lived. According to records, after the liberation, Zhu Qizhao donated his house to the state and moved with his family to Dongsibatiao to live.

Strictly speaking, Zhu Qiju spent more than ten years in this mansion. After the Japanese occupation of Peiping, the courtyard was also occupied, and it was not returned until after the War of Resistance. However, due to Zhu Qiju's position as a political figure during the Beiyang government and the Republic of China, and his careful construction after acquiring this courtyard in the 1930s, this courtyard is different from the traditional Beijing courtyard. According to records, the courtyard is divided into two parts, east and west, separated by a corridor, which is covered with painted and quite exquisite.

Today, walking into the Guangliang Gate, the corridor of the courtyard still exists, but the two sides are full of debris. Old residents of the courtyard said that the courtyard was used as a kindergarten for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs after liberation and was converted into an ordinary house in the 1960s. "In the early years, the first door was a shadow wall, and the second door from the side was a corridor." Later, the residents felt that this was too troublesome, so they opened a hole in the shadow wall and let the corridor face the courtyard door directly.

In the courtyard, the ridges of two-storey old houses and the undulating private buildings on the flat roof are staggered, and it is impossible to see the pattern of that year. According to the records, the two sides of the corridor should be four small courtyards each, but now it is difficult to identify, and only a meter wide road remains between the houses. "In that room, it is said that Zhu Qizhao was a dance hall when he was there, and the courtyard part was like a high-class clubhouse." Some residents recalled. The painted paintings that can be seen everywhere in the courtyard were shoveled during the Cultural Revolution. After the 1976 Tangshan earthquake, temporary houses in the courtyard mushroomed, so that the compound that can still be seen in its original form has become what it is today.

On the east side of the corridor, there is also a small two-story building. Residents said the building was built in 2009, and media reported on the private construction of the small house, but it was not investigated. There were more than ten bags of cement piled up at the entrance of the courtyard, "Someone is going to start building the second floor these days." An old resident said that as a dormitory of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the hospital had been inhabited by many officials of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. But more than half of the bungalows are currently rented out. "If you demolish the houses built later, you should still be able to see what it looked like back then, because when the small house was built, the main house basically did not move much."

Some cultural protection enthusiasts have appealed for the former residence of Zhu Qizhao to be vacated and repaired for proper storage. However, residents said there was no news of any vacancies at the moment.

Source: Beijing Evening News - Beijing Evening New Visual Network Author: Zhang Shuo