The stone-ringed door is the most special feature of Shanghai residential houses, also to be found nowadays as symbol of modern Shanghai urban culture. A house with an old style stone-ringed door has entrances on both sides of front and back. The front façade is made up with patio, enclosure, wing-rooms and frontpiece with stone-ringed door in the middle. It takes stones as edge pillars and solid heavy wood with black painting as wing. Hence its name “stone-ringed door”.
Compared with old style stone-ringed doors, the new style stone-ringed doors are different in appearance. They don’t use stone as rings but apply pottery bricks for erection and stability, enhanced by a more complicated decoration. The new style stone-ringed door is more western in architectural style.
As product of architecture and culture, stone-ringed doors play an important role in the history of modern Chinese architecture. Its popularity was unbroken through all the changes of life style from court-yard houses to modern urban dwellings. Up to today, there are still many urban citizens living in a house with stone-ringed doors, older than a century. These doors are a unique and special characteristic in the international metropolis city of Shanghai. |
