Uploaded on 2014-11-06 by xinsu

[1]: https://edxuploads.s3.amazonaws.com/14152994749431594.jpg This photo is taken in Liede, Guangzhou, China last summer. In the background are the newly built, expensive residential buildings and in front of which is the relocated ancestor halls of the village. Liede was an agriculture village in Guangzhou but as the city developed and expanded, farmland were slowly swallowed by urban context and eventually the village itself. Self-built houses were torn down and estate developer took the land, built new residential buildings, gave some of apartments back to the villagers and sold the rests. Ancestor halls are considered as historical heritage so they were kept and relocated at a conner of the project. The invisible information are: 1. The object of ancestor halls were kept but the way to relocated them together was incorrect. Villages in China was base on Clans. Ancestor hall is the gathering place for the clan and usually located somehow in the physical center of the habitation. Is is for big clan events but also works as "community center" for the old villagers. However now they are outside the residential buildings(separated by walls and has guards at the entrance) and become a pretty decoration. 2. When the village still exist, it served as a low-cost rental area for the city, because of its central location yet low quality built housing. The lower class tenant, which is in fact the base of the city, were pushed away as the rental price is 10 times higher then before. 3. Because of the agriculture background, the villages are usually built along the water(rivers/streams) at a lower land. They are potentially sites to solve urban flooding considering their quantity and location, and maybe can work together with the ancestor hall system to develop a better blue/green system which can benefit larger area.