A Chinese take on England's heritage 泰晤士小鎮
Thames Town is a new residential development in Songjiang district about 30 km from central Shanghai. Modeled on an English county town, Thames Town was completed in 2006 and offers low density housing to 10,000 members of Shanghai's elite, who could afford the above average property prices.
Other western style "towns" were also constructed as part of a larger development plan, the "One City, Nine Towns" policy to attract people away from downtown Shanghai to the suburbs with Canadian, Dutch, German, Italian, Scandinavian and Spanish architectural themes. The project has had varying degrees of success with interest in the new towns and their homes patchy to say the least.
Ye Olde England
Thames Town acknowledges five hundred years of British architectural styles including Tudor half-timbered buildings, Victorian brick and Regency stone.
WS Atkins plc were given the job of creating a little bit of England in the heart of China. British architects have been active in Shanghai since the 19th century so Shanghai is no stranger to quirky western styles.
The buildings reproduced included a fish and chip shop (now a photo studio) modeled on an original in Lyme Regis in Dorset, a church (popular for wedding photos), a pub, a castle, a Covent Garden-inspired covered market, red telephone boxes, a village green, cobbled streets, double yellow lines and even statues of such British heroes as James Bond, Harry Potter and Winston Churchill.
Thames Town was planned to provide homes for the staff of the universities at nearby Songjiang University Town - a massive educational hub with nine universities.
However, many of the homes on offer were bought as second homes or as investments and not all of the housing is permanently occupied, though an epithet of "ghost town" to describe Thames Town would be a bit harsh.
Access
Thames Town is 4 km from Songjiang New City station on Shanghai metro Line 9.
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