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.

King’s Lynn apartments

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.

Hudec buildings West 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.

Leaving Route Kaufmann

Today was a major change in Shanghai for me. After 12 years of living in Old Shanghai houses (nearly all my stay in Shanghai), we finally moved to a modern high rise. My first Old Shanghai home was at the corner of Rue Lafayette (today Fuxing Lu) and Rue Pottier (today BaoQing Lu), beginning Avenue Pétain (today HengShan Lu), where I staid one year. More information about this great former banker’s home is available in post First home in Old Shanghai. We then moved to the end of a lane of the tranquil Route Kaufmann. There are several posts on this blog about buildings on this great street (Follow this link to find them).

Passage 81 Route Kaufmann (Anting Lu 81), was the entrance to a private lane, Route d’Adina. This small street has no name today, only Anting Lu 81. Living there was not merely a time travel, it was practically a time trap.

House Anting Lu
Leaving the house

Waking up to the sounds of birds in the surrounding garden, at the very end of a quiet lane felt like living in Old Shanghai. Although we shared the house with 4 -5 neighbors (including some really evil ones), we had a 2 bedroom apartment in an old house, with most of the original doors, ceilings and windows. This apartment was just like a time machine and having taken it empty, we filled it slowly but surely with lot’s of Old Shanghai treasures found here and there.

sculpture Anting lu
Doors sculpture

I have often though about the original (wealthy) owners of the house (probably Chinese from my research). With the level of details, I assume they took great care in building this Spanish Revival house around 1936. Unfortunately for them, by 1937 the Japanese attacked Shanghai, invading the concessions in 1941. Then the Chinese revolution came in 1949 and the house was probably confiscated, if the original owners were still living in it. I can probably say that we lived longer in there than the original owner, while really caring about the house. Unfortunately, some of the others inhabitant were not so careful

When I moved in, the house was in a good state, though it clearly was not really cared about. It was really similar to Eastern Europe communism confiscation of bourgeois property, sharing a beautiful building among numerous people who used it without care. Unfortunately, in the last 10 years, needed maintenance was lacking, including massive roof repair (to stop water leaks !), water proofing the walls, pruning the trees that obscured the house and cleaning the garden that became a jungle. Since nobody was willing to do anything… it became clear at some point that we needed to get away.  We waited as much as we could, but finally moved yesterday.

view
Room with a view

The major change is that we moved to a high rise. This is definitely a jump in time, a slide from Shanghai 1930’s straight to modern Shanghai. The great advantage is the view, overlooking Xu Jia Hui Park. We have moved to modernity but not left the French Concession, now living at the corner of Route Destelan (GuangYuan Lu) and Route Prosper Paris (Tianping lu), nor left our lovely furnitures and other items. Moving to modernity will surely not be the end of the passion for Old Shanghai nor of this blog… which is now turning 10 years old.

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.

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.

130 Route Kaufmann
House 130 Route Kaufmann

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.

Staircase
Beautiful staircase

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).