Sai Ying Pun Community Complex is located at 2

High Street High Street is a common street name for the primary business street of a city, town, or village, especially in the United Kingdom and Commonwealth. It implies that it is the focal point for business, especially shopping. It is also a metonym fo ...

Sai Ying Pun Sai Ying Pun is an area in Western District, on Hong Kong Island, in Hong Kong. It is administratively part of the Central and Western District. Etymology In Cantonese, ''Sai'' () means "west" and ''Ying Pun'' () means "camp", especially a ...

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China ( abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delt ...

. It is a 9-storey building built on the site of the Old Mental Hospital, of which only the granite facade and arched verandah were preserved.

History

The Old Mental Hospital was built in 1892. It was designed by Danby & Leigh (now

Leigh & Orange Leigh & Orange Ltd ( Chinese: 利安, formerly known as 李柯倫治), founded in Hong Kong in 1874, is an international architectural and interior design practice. The group has a total of 550 staff and operates through its headquarter ...

). It was used as a quarters for the European nursing staff of the Civil Hospital (1846-1937) until the

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

Antiquities and Monuments Office The Antiquities and Monuments Office (AMO) was established in 1976 under the Antiquities and Monuments Ordinance to protect and preserve Hong Kong's historic monuments. Housed in the Former Kowloon British School, the AMO is responsible for iden ...

Brief Information on Proposed Grade 1 Items. Item #97.
/ref> Originally, it contains only 10 bedrooms for the nurses, a matron's office, a chemical laboratory, 12 servants' quarters and other living, dining, kitchen, office and storage facilities. In the 1940s, the east wing was extended and six more arches were added to the original north facade, containing 18 arches with a pediment marking the middle and

turret Turret may refer to: * Turret (architecture), a small tower that projects above the wall of a building * Gun turret, a mechanism of a projectile-firing weapon * Objective turret, an indexable holder of multiple lenses in an optical microscope * Mi ...

s at the ends to form a classically proportioned structure, during an extension uphill. The building was used to accommodate staff in 1941.

Mental Hospital

It was turned into a mental hospital after the war. In 1947, this mental hospital was the only one of its type in the city when the population in Hong Kong was one and a half million. The building was a female block of the mental hospital in the 1940s.Properties
/ref> It continued to function as such until the Castle Peak Mental Hospital opened in 1961, and switched back as a day treatment centre for psychiatric out-patients until 1971.

High Street Ghost House

Tales of ghostly sightings were spread since it was abandoned in the 1970s. Therefore, it is popularly known as "High Street Ghost House" or ''Haunted House in High Street''. This building became the haunt of curious teenagers and drug addicts who used the

methadone Methadone, sold under the brand names Dolophine and Methadose among others, is a synthetic opioid agonist used for chronic pain and also for opioid dependence. It is used to treat chronic pain, and it is also used to treat addiction to heroin ...

clinic nearby before the reconstruction, because the building remained unoccupied for 20 years from 1970s. It fell into disrepair and was badly ruined by two fires, which were believed to be inadvertently started by trespassers. The Hong Kong Government decided in 1990s to keep the

façade A façade () (also written facade) is generally the front part or exterior of a building. It is a Loanword, loan word from the French language, French (), which means 'frontage' or 'face'. In architecture, the façade of a building is often t ...

and rebuild a community centre within. In 2001, work was finally completed. Therefore, only the north façade of the historic building is restored and preserved during the construction of Sai Ying Pun Community Complex as the historic building is the only specimen of its kind in Hong Kong. The remains of the historic building is a Grade I Historic Building. It is part of the

Central and Western Heritage Trail The Central and Western Heritage Trail is a Heritage trails in Hong Kong, Heritage Trail in Hong Kong, that was designed by the Antiquities and Monuments Office of the Leisure and Cultural Services Department. It covers the Central and Western Dist ...

Facilities

There is a community hall in the Sai Ying Pun Community Complex. It now houses several charity organizations, which provide services to the local community.

Gallery

Image:HK High Street SYP Community Complex.jpg Image:HK High Street SYP Community Complex usage2.jpg, The directory of the Complex Image:HK High Street SYP Community Complex uses.jpg, The floor plan of the Complex Image:HK High Street SYP Community Complex decor2.jpg,

References

External links

Sai Ying Pun Community Complex: Rehabilitation

Old Mental Hospital (Sai Ying Pun Community Complex Community Hall)
{{Coord, 22.284892, 114.144081, type:landmark_region:HK, display=title Grade I historic buildings in Hong Kong Sai Ying Pun