LettersIconic Hong Kong theatre and Singapore’s Golden Mile: mixing business sense with heritage

Name: Hong Kong’s iconic State Theatre to be preserved under multibillion-dollar redevelopment plan
Uploaded: 2020-10-18T23:00:12.000Z
Duration: 1 min 22 s
Description: Hong Kong’s iconic State Theatre to be preserved under multibillion-dollar redevelopment plan

May the conservation of State Theatre, a historic landmark in North Point, be the start of a new socially responsible business approach to Hong Kong heritage

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Exterior view of Blue House in Wan Chai. The Blue House cluster, three 20th century shophouse blocks (Blue House, Yellow House, and Orange House), won top honours in the 2017 Unesco Asia-Pacific Awards for Cultural Heritage Conservation. Photo: Nora Tam

Letters

Published: 7:00am, 19 Oct 2020Updated: 7:00am, 19 Oct 2020

I write to expand on Professor Ho Puay-peng’s piece “Why conservation of State Theatre is a landmark project for Hong Kong” (October 14). The decision by Adrian Cheng Chi-kong, third-generation owner of New World Development, to revamp rather than demolish Hong Kong’s last standing movie palace is unorthodox yet farsighted.

Given that the North Point site set was acquired at what was a record sale for a compulsory auction, it was reasonable to expect that the developer would maximise investment returns by filling up the lot with new high-rises. But not this time.

By placing conservation at the heart of the redevelopment project, rather than as a weak afterthought, the developer is making a statement that this is not business as usual.

Besides bringing back to life a historic landmark – the iconic arch-beam roof of State Theatre is a design feature which, once seen, is hard to forget – the commitment to conservation is corporate social responsibility in action. It should also hugely raise the company’s brand value. The progressive move by the Harvard-educated Cheng has highlighted the business case for heritage.

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Hong Kong’s iconic State Theatre to be preserved under multibillion-dollar redevelopment plan

The day after the State Theatre conservation announcement, Singapore’s Urban Redevelopment Authority proposed the conservation of Golden Mile Complex, an architectural masterpiece that captures the buoyancy and invention of the nation’s formative years in the early 1970s. The unexpected wins for modernist gems in Hong Kong and Singapore on successive days are significant.

.css-1mniedq{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;} May the conservation of State Theatre, a historic landmark in North Point, be the start of a new socially responsible business approach to Hong Kong heritage

May the conservation of State Theatre, a historic landmark in North Point, be the start of a new socially responsible business approach to Hong Kong heritage