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Chinatown(s) Neighborhood

Chinatown comparisons to Los Angeles

1) Architecture in terms of housing in Chinatown has some striking differences when compared to the rest of Los Angeles. The housing data collected in Chinatown show that 94 percent of occupied housing is renter-occupied, which is a higher percentage of renters compared to the 52 percent in Los Angeles County (Chen, 2009). Only six percent are homeowners, which is significantly smaller than Los Angeles County’s (48%). This demonstrates how the lower socioeconomic levels of Chinatown in the past still have application today. Furthermore, it illustrates deeper issues such as affordability and displacement of Chinatown natives which can cause identity issues (Semuels, 2019).

2) The architecture of restaurants in Chinatown reflects similar themes in other ethnic enclaves of the city. The “Neo-Pagoda” architecture of buildings like the Golden Pagoda, is prevalent in other neighborhoods like Little Tokyo, or Olvera street that was developed by Christine Sterling as well. Another character defining feature of a lot of chinatown restaurants is the neon lighting which is a design theme throughout the city whether it be movie theaters, drive ins, bars and vernacular signage.

3) The architecture of Chinatown today seems to me very fitting within the broader Los Angeles style. So much of the city is built up on a foundation of fiction, that it doesn’t surprise me much to hear that Chinatown was designed by Hollywood set designers. It feels both authentic and not– if it’s excessive and not authentically Chinese, it is authentically Los Angeles.

4) The architecture of Old Chinatown is probably better described as the architecture of Mexican California. The adobe building style has its own history that predates the annexation of California by the United States. A whole book could be written about adobe buildings in the American west, from native American styles, Spanish/Mexican adaptations, to Chinese-American use.

5) Relatively few writing has been done on the architectural merit of small homes lived in by impoverished peoples. Architectural criticism in the West has mainly focussed on large, monumental buildings, exemplary of the finest achievements of a particular civilization (Roth). Therefore, architectural criticism of the aesthetics, construction, and use of these adobe homes will be hard to find. Instead, we must rely on first-hand accounts of the experience of those places and other vernacular voices from the past to reconstruct these lost buildings.

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2. Fiction Story Background: The story of a young Asian American in their 20s moving from Queens to LA’s Chinatown today (or sometime after the new Chinatown was built). We’re imagining him/her thinking of their grandfather who moved to LA from China when the Old Chinatown was still around, and kind of re-exploring their roots. We will try and explore why the family moved to New York but will keep the focus on LA’s Chinatown in the 1930s. Hopefully, this structure can let us talk about different generations in this person’s family while exploring architecture.