Changde Apartment

[1] It was originally the property of the Italian Raoul Faith and the majority of its occupants were middle to upper class people.

She would visit the market and the cinema during her stay there and could only fall asleep to the sound of local trams clinking at night.

In the prose My View on Su Qing, she wrote: ‘The frontiers of Shanghai undulate slightly, shrouded in the mist of the late dusk.

I think of the fate of many people; an ash grey feeling of vast and hazy fates, including my own, arouse from inside me.’[3] In the article Notes of Delight in the Living of Changde Apartment, Eileen Chang describes her apartment life:[4] 'I like to listen to the sound of the city.

People who are more poetic than me lie on their pillows, listening to the soughing of the wind in the pines from the forest, or the roaring of the crashing waves of the sea.

They are eager to see that one day they can return to the crop land, raise bees and grow vegetables, and enjoy the blessings of living in ease and comfort.

The writer, Chen Danyan described in the book Candyfloss Romances in Shanghai that Changde Apartment was 'painted in the light flesh tone of a woman's makeup setting powder, standing tall and upright under the blue sky in the downtown area of Shanghai.'

However, the downstairs floor opened an Eileen Chang-themed bookstore, named Eddington Literary House (Qian Cai Shu Fang), which is built according to the style of the period, and this attracts crowds of Eileen Chang fans who come to make a ‘pilgrimage’ for their idol.

Presumably due to its age, the building has a slight dull-grey hue, as if the rouge contaminated by the dust that was used by women of old days.

[1][4] The entire building is decorated with delicate partial ornamentations in a concave shape, and the wings turn backward.

It is said that the private studio of director Wong Kar-Wai (wáng jiā wèi 王家卫) is also hidden in the building.