ABSTRACT

The gate and walls can be dated back at least to the walled city when the city was for military defence. The enlarged version of courtyard housing is the walled city; a typical example is the Forbidden City in Beijing. It was, historically, the key desire line integrating Beijing's outer city with the overarching hierarchical structure that rendered imperial rule in physical form. It is simultaneously the bridge and gate between the closed domestic realm and open network of modern societal relations that are aggregated in the spaces of China's cities today. This accords with the experience of the modern city outlined by Shane, albeit that his analysis does not concern itself with the qualitative nature of the spaces that result. Familiarity in form and consumption also make it home to micro-networks of foreign tourism that spread eastwards from the city-centre through Dongcheng.