LVK Archives - Shanghailander

Route Kaufmann, Frenchtown

In more than 20 years in Shanghai (and counting), I spent many years in the former French concession but one location in particular remains a clear favorite. This was on Route Kaufmann (today Anting lu / 安亭路), where I spent 10 years. Living at the back a small lane really felt like living in Old Shanghai, and many post of this blog were inspired by the area.

Named after a former Yunnan Postal Service officer who was killed during WW1, Route Kaufmann was a wealthy and eclectic area. It was also very international as confirmed by a friend whose Chinese professor in the US once lived on Route Kaufman before 1949. This was still a fantastic place to live around 2010, and it took a real effort to move out as explained in post “Leaving Route Kaufmann“.

Location of Route Kaufmann 1913 (red dot)

As shown as above map from 1913, this area was the countryside when the French Concession was officially extended in 1914. As Route Kaufmann is on the western side of the French Concession, it was probably divided in plots and occupied from the mid 1920s. This area of the French Concession was divided in blocks that were sold to developers.

A large part of the West side of the road was sold to FONCIM that ordered design from Léonard & Veysseyre. Some of these houses where already described in a series of posts (see posts “Portrait of an old neighbour” and “Meet the twin sister” for more details).

French style house on 130 Route Kaufmann, designed by LVK

The FONCIM plot probably also included Route Cohen (Gao An Lu / 高安路), that runs parallel to Route Kaufmann on the Western side. The West side of Route Cohen also counts many buildings developed by FONCIM with design from LVK, mostly apartment buildings.

FONCIM buildings on Route Cohen, designed by LVK

On the East side of route Kaufmann, a large share was sold to Asia Realty Company (ARCO), an American real estate company that flourished in Shanghai at that time. The East side is also the location of the King’s Lynn Apartments where Chester Fritz and Bernardine Szold Fritz, lived for a while. The cadastre shows this plot as property of ARCO, although I have not seen ARCO sign like on Brooklyn Court, another ARCO property.

On the East side, ARCO commissioned Hungarian architect Laszlo Hudec to create houses on the plot between Route Kaufmann and Route Dufour (today Wulumuqi Lu /乌鲁木齐南路）, with some on the Eastern side of Route Dufour.

The list of inhabitants of rue Kaufmann in 1933 shows that many people lived on 9 Rue Kaufmann, which is the above mentioned King’s Lynn apartment. Chester Fritz had already left the building on that year. The Lubeck family, of one of the director of the CFTEE, Carlos Lubeck is also mentioned at number 132. I was also told that Ma Ying-chi / 马英驰, the minister of Justice of Republican China lived in 130 at some point, but in 1933 this was the home of the reverend F. Rawlison.

There is a large gap between #4 and #126. Although the cadastre shows that the land between these number was already divided, many of the buildings on the streets were not built yet. For example, the large Art Deco House located on 46 Anting lu now part of the Anting Villa Hotel, was not built yet. Similarly, on the odd side, nothing much seem to exist besides #9.

Another missing part then was today’s Anting Lu 81, the lane were I used to live in. While living there, I realized that our small lane had its own name on French Concession maps. It was called Rue d’Adina, Route d’Adina, or sometimes “Route privée d’Adina”, Chinese name was 安地那路. This was very unusual for Shanghai street name, so I started to research it. This will be the topic of further posts.

French Master of Shanghai Art Deco

Le Petit Journal Shanghai edition has republished an article about Art Deco in Shanghai, focusing mostly on the work of Léonard, Vesseyre and Kruze firm. I wrote the article together with my friend David Maurizot in 2018.

The article is in French only and can be found following the link below:

https://lepetitjournal.com/shanghai/a-voir-a-faire/promenade-historique-les-maitres-francais-de-lart-deco-shanghai-221435

It’s a great way to enjoy autumn in Shanghai.

Déjà Vu from Paris to Shanghai

With its mix of influence, Old Shanghai had bits of pieces coming from all over the World including Beaux Arts style, Art Deco, Andalusian, Mexican revival, New Normand, German, traditional Japanese to name a few. They all added up and sometimes got inspired by traditional local style or its modern incarnation, neo confusion (sometimes called Republican style). While walking around in Old Shanghai, it’s sometimes surprising to see details that are heavily influenced by another place.

Art Deco floor tiles pattern — Pattern on Jian Guo Lu

I have been fascinated by the floor tiling pattern in the picture up, since I discovered it a few years ago. The original picture was taken on the ground floor of the FONCIM D building (1933) at the corner of Jian Guo lu and Gao An lu. The building was designed by the firm Leonard, Vesseyre & Kruze (or LVK) (See post ” Shanghai Art Deco master” for more details or my article, in French, in Lepetitjournal.com Shanghai edition). The firm was highly creative and the building was designed for their largest client, the FONCIM real estate investment firm, so I first assumed it was unique.

FONCIM D, by LVK (thanks Shanghai kat for the picture)

The only other similar pattern I found was in a villa on Yong Jia Lu, a few hundred meters from the FONCIM building. The area was built by the LVK firm (Leonard and Vesseyre’s personal homes are nearly opposite from this building), including this one, probably from the mid 30’s. The tiling shape is slightly different, with the beige stripe wider, but still very similar. This was the only place were I saw this pattern until a recent trip. A later found a similar pattern with different colors in a building on Hunan Lu (see post more on tile patterns).

Similar floor patter (picture ShanghaiKat)

Having diner in Paris a few days ago, I realized that the early 1900’s building had been extended by an Art Deco part with the tiling on the picture right. It took a while to retrieve the Shanghai picture, but when confronting both, the similarity was striking. So the Shanghai Art Deco pattern was probably not the invention of LVK, but probably imported from France. Looking for more about this pattern, I received a big help from my friends of the France Art Deco Facebook group (https://www.facebook.com/groups/franceartdeco).

A similar pattern was used for the flooring of the kitchen of flagship cruiser SS Normandie. Launched in 1935, SS Normandie was the largest cruise ship of its time, a floating palace fully designed in Art Deco Style. Because of WW2, it only operated a few years before sinking in New York in 1942, but it is still a legend in term of cruise ships, technological achievement and as an Art Deco masterpiece. Exemple of the ship’s decoration was shown in the Paris Art Deco exhibition in 2014 (see post “1925, when art deco dazzled the World” for more details).

Kitchen of the Normandie — Same pattern in the kitchen of the Normandie cruise ship

Unfortunately, all pictures of the Normandie are black and white, so it’s impossible to know the original color of the kitchen tiling, but in any case it looked quite similar to the one used by LVK on Jian Guo Lu. As the pattern originated from France and it is so rare in Shanghai, it is likely that the actual tilling was imported from France. Old Shanghai was a modern city, in touch with the latest fashion in the World… just like it is today.

More location with the same pattern in Shanghai can be found in post “More on tile patterns“.

Shanghai’s Art Deco Master

Like a number of those before on Shanghailander.net this book review is a biased one. Just like “Peace at the Cathay“or “Promenades dans l’ancienne concession Française“, the book was written by friends of mine, in that case Spencer Dodington & Charles Lagrange. Furthermore, I was actually involved in the project itself, though only for a tiny bit. In any case, this books really fills a hole in Old Shanghai studies.

Having lived in Shanghai for about 10 years, and discovering its history and architecture, I long dreamed that somebody put as much efforts into studying work of French architecture firm “Leonard, Vesseyre & Kruze”, as that was the case for British firm Palmer & Turner and Hungarian architect Laszlo Hudec. It took a team of a Belgian and an American authors to actually deliver in-depth study of the French firm. LVK was a major influence of the architectural style of Old Shanghai and this books truly highlight this heritage, focusing on the life of principal architect Paul Vesseyre.

Thanks to enormous archive research, in-depth knowledge of Shanghai and access to the archives of the Vesseyre family, the authors give a precise account of the early life of the architect, as well as his voyage to Shanghai. Just like contemporay Laszlo Hudec, Paull Vesseyre architecture studies were interrupted by WW1. He then returned to France, taking part of rebuilding one of main French Art Deco cities, Reims before sent by French construction firm Brossard & Mopin to Tianjin, and then Shanghai. He met Alexandre Leonard there, and both created firm Leonard & Vesseyre architects in 1922. Their debut work was the new building of the Cercle Sportif Français on Rue Mercier, today’s Okura Garden Hotel on Maoming Lu. This major work became an anchor of the French Concession and insured the success of the company and both men personal wealth.

Leonard & Vesseyre created most of the modern buildings in the French concession. They worked for the Catholic Church, the municipality and most prolifically for the French developer FONCIM. Major pieces include Béarn and Gascogne apartments on Avenue Joffre (today Huai Hai Lu), the Dauphine and the Boissezon apartments. LV&K was also the designer of the series of neo-normandy style houses aroung Jian Guo Lu and Gao An Lu (see portrait of an old neighbour and further posts on this topic), as well as many buildings in that neighborhood. All of them and many more are analysed in the book, making it an essential piece of the knowledge and understanding of Old Shanghai. The book is currently only available in English, published by Earnshaw book. A French version in under preparation.

Meet the twin sister

I was writing about an old villa in recent post “Portrait of an old neighbour”. Like many cases in Shanghai 1920’s and 1930’s, the developer did not built one house… but two next to each other. This house has a twin sister, actually located on 132 Route Kaufman, next to the original one at 130 Route Kaufman. I was mentioning in my original post that the building was of high quality and would make a great renovation. As it turns out that the sister house has been fully renovated and is in fact a well known bar, Cotton’s, located in the next house on the street.

Since both houses were nearly identical at origin, comparing pictures taken in both houses gives great ideas on how this old neighbor could be revived into today’s standard. At the same time, it also shows the extend of renovation and transformation that has been done to N132, the house that is now the bar. Most of the renovation was not done by the current house tenant, but a few years before.

The house porch has been little modified except with the addition of an external door. The front steps have also been changed for something shiny and new. Concrete floor (with probably the same circle shape) has been covered with wood floor.

The double wooden shutters have been replaced by a single one, that was probably easier to build than the original one. This also probably means that all windows frames have also been replaced.

renovated inside doors — Original Kitchen doors

Wood floors on all floors have been changed for new. Although the replacement is nice, is does not have the look nor the quality of the original inlay. As seen on picture left, the inside doors and door frames have old been for new and shiny. Looking at the state of the original ones in the non-renovated version it seems that a good cleaning and a nice wood varnishing would have allowed to keep the original doors that have sustained 80 years of mistreatment. In any case, the replacement fit more or less the original profile though they had a classical touch to a building that is definitely not classical style.

Addition of a classical touch was also done on the inside balcony. The original one was probably the same as next door… but surely not the current one. It’s interesting how the banister has been transformed by adding under it small colons that were not needed since they did not exist in the original staircase.

All in all, the renovation of 132 Route Kaufmann is not really museum class, as the material used do not really match the quality of the original. A different (and out of place) style has been introduced, putting pieces of classical castle style to a 20’s house. It seems the renovation was more following the fantasy of the owner than the original building. However, most of the original design has been kept, keeping the general feeling of the house intact and giving real atmosphere to the bar. One of the rare places with real firewood in Shanghai, Cotton’s was still one of my favorite hangout until it closed down in 2023.

While researching these two houses, I realized that there are about 10 similar houses in the neighborhood. They were all designed by French architecture firm Léonard & Veysseyre, built by the International Saving Society (ISS) and rented out by companies to house their managers. The house on 132 Route Kaufmann was inhabited by Carlos Lubeck, a director of the French Tram and Electricity company (CFTEE) (see post about the Lubeck family for more details).

The house on 130 Route Kaufmann was rumored to have been the house of Ma Ying-chi / 马英驰, the minister of Justice of Republican China (see post “Portrait of an Old Neighbour” for more details)

Portrait of an old neighbour

Living on Route Kaufmann (today Anting Lu), I have spent a lot of time looking around the neighboring old buildings. This street is a short one, a side street from Route Herve de Seyes (Yong Jia Lu) and Route Joseph Frelupt (Jiang Guo lu). It is located in the Western part of the French Concession, that was really developed in the mid-late 1930’s. The name in French on the 1927’s map is Route (and not Rue) indicating that they were rather country roads than urban streets. This is similar to Bubbling Well Road (Today Nanjing Xi Lu) in the International Settlement. As this area was not really urbanized, developers could buy large properties and build large garden villas.

Many wealthy foreigners and Chinese families lived in this quiet and relaxed neighborhood. Since most of these villas had garages, people living in the area had surely cars, and the streets were probably filled with 1930’s Cadillac and other Ford and Renault imported from Europe and the US. The atmosphere then with the streets lined up with walls masking great brand new villas must have been quite similar to today’s HongQiao area with the Villa’s compounds.

Most of those villas are now closed to the public with iron gates stopping the occasional visitor to come in. As I live in the neighborhood and spend a lot of time around with my camera, I am becoming well known by the old people mostly living in the villas. A little bit of Shanghainese language often does the trick and allows me to take pictures without disturbing anybody. I recently got a chance to get into the house on 130 Route Kaufman and take some pictures.

This house is very similar to houses of the same period built in France. It was designed by Vesseyre & Leonard, along with 2 other houses on each side that are of similar style. The entrance has seen better days but still keeps up appearances. I particularly enjoy the covered front that is creating an outside entrance hall. Like similar houses in France, shutters were installed on ground floor windows. It is quite rare to still see them in today’s Shanghai.

I then moved to the inside, while talking with a lady living there. The picture left is the actual entrance door, still in place. The round part on the top was probably a glass and metal ornament. The glass must have been smashed at some point and replaced by the cheaper piece of wood. It is typical from Leonard & Veysseyre style.

Original inside doors are still in the building, matching the pattern of the entrance door. The far door leads to the what is the kitchen today and I think was the main kitchen in the old time. It has a back door, so that domestics could come into the kitchen without using the main entrance door, using the back service entrance instead. The nearest door leads to the bathroom… with appliances from the 1930’s still in use without have been cleaned for a long time.

Moving up through the stair case, it is easy to realize the money and time spent into creating this house. After years of over use and neglect, the staircase still looks great, including the small inside balcony. The house does not seem to have structural damages apart from water leaking over the main entrance. It is always amazing to see how these houses have survived decades of overuse and neglect and are still standing. People living in this houses mostly have no idea of the value and craft that was put into building them. Then often pay very little if anything at all to live here, so why bother taking care of a building that is just (in their mind) an old ruin? Similar houses in France that have been well maintained still looks grand and those in Shanghai could be turned back to the same grandeur.

This house on 130 Route Kaufman is rumored to have been the house of Ma Ying-chi / 马英驰, the minister of Justice of Republican China. This is highly possible as the area was inhabited by Kuomingtang heads, including Chiang Kai-Shek, TV Soong, HH Kung & Soong Ailing and Kuomintang Chief Spy Dai Li / 戴笠. The clone house on 132 Route Kaufman was the house of one of the directors of the French Tramway and Electricity company (CFTEE).