2013-07-01 11:21:38
By Ruth Morris PRI's The World, Thames Town
China is well known for its pirated DVDs and fake iPhones, but this "copycat
culture" extends to architecture too - with whole towns sometimes replicated.
As you enter Thames Town, the honking and chaos of Chinese city life fall away.
There are no more street vendors selling steamed pork buns, and no more men
hauling recyclables on tricycles.
The road starts to wind, and then, in the distance, you see what looks like a
clock tower from a Cotswold village.
"It has this almost dreamlike quality of something European," says Tony Mackay,
a British architect, and the master planner for the Thames Town housing scheme
and the surrounding district of Songjiang.
When local officials hired Mackay in 2001, he found farms and ducks here.
Today, there are cobbled streets, pubs and half-timbered Tudor houses.
There's even a statue of Winston Churchill, and a medieval meeting hall that
advertises chicken wings and beer in Chinese characters.
But Mackay is not happy. "It doesn't look quite right," he says. "It looks
false."
Mackay says the architects who took on the designs for the buildings created a
pastiche, throwing together different styles, and abandoning authenticity.
Some of the half-timbered houses are six storeys high, for example, and the
windows on the church just don't look right, he says.
"The proportions are wrong. The use of the different stones is all wrong. It
would never be used like that in the genuine English church," he says.
The houses in Thames Town were largely bought as investment properties, so the
town has always been quiet. It is only just beginning to develop a real sense
of life and community.
To Mackay, the place looks like a film set. In fact, one Western blogger said
it reminded him of the film, The Truman Show.
A couple posing for photos in Thames Town, China
But Fan Yu Zhe couldn't care less.
I found Fan and his bride Sun Qi Yao looking deeply into each other's eyes as a
photo assistant showered them with flower petals.
Thames Town is crawling with young couples who want to have their wedding
photos taken here.
"I love European football, so I'm very interested in things from Europe," says
Fan.
"I really hope I can visit the real Thames River one day, sit along the banks,
drink a cup of coffee and enjoy the British sunshine."
Nearby, a woman named Zhang Li snacks on tangerines and plays cards with her
mother and aunt.
Zhang says she has come here on her day off because Chinese towns are so
crowded and commercial, but here it's green and pleasant. And as an office
administrator, she can't afford to travel to England.
"Usually if you want to see foreign buildings, you have to go abroad," says
Zhang. "But if we import them to China, people can save money while
experiencing foreign-style architecture."
There's plenty of that in China.
Thames Town was built as part of Shanghai's "One City, Nine Towns" scheme,
which saw a cluster of satellite towns built around the city, each in a
different international style.
Elsewhere in China, there is a replica Eiffel Tower, a mock Tower Bridge - even
a recreation of Stonehenge.
And last year, a replica of the entire Austrian alpine village of Hallstatt
sprung up in the province of Guangdong. The original is a Unesco World Heritage
site.
The world in China
These are all examples of China's craze for what Bianca Bosker, author of
Original Copies: Architectural Mimicry in Contemporary China, calls
"duplitecture".
Of course, it's not just the Chinese who love to copy. A century and a half
ago, the rapidly progressing United States was a hub of counterfeiting and
copying and it too has a host of more recent architectural replicas, including
country pavilions in Epcot in Florida, and plenty of examples in Las Vegas.
But according to Bosker, while many Westerners think of knock-off architecture
as kitsch and bizarre, many in China find it truly lovely.
Knockoffs galore
Officials in China in front of a large pile of fake computer hardware and
software
Ben Goodger, IP expert, Edwards Wildman:
"China is the world centre for counterfeiting. Whatever can make a quick buck -
mobile phones, pirated DVDs, fake watches, jewellery, branded clothing and so
on.
"There is a very different starting point. In China, to copy something is to
show deep respect. Traditional society in China is very hierarchical. You have
the masters of their art, and a lot of artists saw copying one of the masters -
as exactly as possible - as being the highest thing they could do, because the
master was the great genius.
"The idea of the work the artist creates being an extension of his individual
personality - and therefore that to take that is not only unimaginative, but in
some way immoral - is very much a typically Western idea. The idea of it being
cheating in that sense doesn't have much depth in China.
"I'm not saying they are innocent, but there is this cultural attitude, that
copying is a sign of respect."
Almost every major city in China has a residential suburb where people live in
replica mansions, and as many as two-thirds of the properties for sale with
some estate agents are Western-style, she says.
Bosker says that's partly because China has a different attitude towards
copying.
"The culture of copy in China is very different from what we find in the West,
where there's a sense that copying is something incredibly taboo, and to be
avoided at all costs."
In China, she says, mimicry is seen as "a form of mastery", and is therefore
not frowned upon - but encouraged.
This culture of copying has deep historical roots. As China's first emperor,
Qin Shi Huang - of terracotta army fame - conquered rival kingdoms in the 3rd
Century BC, he built a replica of each of their palaces within his own capital
city.
Fast forward to today and the Chinese government often bankrolls major copycat
projects.
It's a way of flexing its muscles, says Bosker. "China is, in a very symbolic
way, showing off its ability to rearrange the cosmos, to sort of own the
greatest hits of the West."
It's no accident, says Bosker, that the White House - the ultimate symbol of US
power - is one of the most copied buildings in China.
But not all Chinese people are supportive of this copycat architecture.
"I don't like them at all," says Tong Ming, a Shanghai-based architect.
China has its own rich architectural heritage, says Tong, like the Classical
Gardens of Suzhou, the Forbidden City in Beijing, and the country's traditional
wooden buildings.
The Classical Gardens of Suzhou, China The Classical Gardens of Suzhou are a
Unesco World Heritage site
Chinese people do value this history, he says, but, at a time of such rapid
change, people find it more practical - and even comforting - to copy Western
styles.
"I think it is quite a specific period of time - people cannot get accustomed
to changing times.
"So it's quite understandable that they would follow something that they
admire, or are familiar with from the mass media," says Tong.
"People want something with a quite clear identity. They couldn't find exactly
what next, so they turn to something they are familiar with."
The Chinese dream
"The way to live best is to eat Chinese food, drive an American car, and live
in a British house" - resident of a Western-style housing development
Source: Original Copies: Architectural Mimicry in Contemporary China
Tong thinks, in time, Chinese architecture will find its own path once again.
In the meantime, some new housing developments are creating Western-style
architecture "with a Chinese skin", says Bosker - incorporating a Chinese
garden layout, for example, or feng shui principles.
British architect Tony Mackay thinks China's imitation towns are a fad - a
by-product of China's desire to connect with the world after decades of
relative isolation - but he sees a new trend emerging.
"The younger generations here they don't want old-fashioned style, they want
modernism. They want something new, which connects to their gear, their iPads,
and their modern lifestyle," he says.
One example is the sleek, ultra-modern, prestige Wangjing SOHO project in
Beijing, by British-Iraqi architect Zaha Hadid.
A composite image showing Zaha Hadid's plans for Wangjing SOHO in Beijing (l)
and a model of the Meiquan 22nd Century building in Chongqing (r) Plans for
Wangjing SOHO in Beijing (l), and a model of a very similar building in
Chongqing (r)
When it's finished, it will resemble three fish-like forms emerging from a
stream.
There's just one problem. A suspiciously similar structure is being built in
the city of Chongqing.
According to one industry publication, the alleged copy may be finished before
the original.