The Jingming Building in Hankou

The Jingming Building in Hankou

The Jingming Building in Hankou is a cultural relic protection unit of Hubei Province.

The Jingming Building in Hankou

Located on Poyang Street in Jiang’an District, Wuhan, the building was designed and managed by the British-owned Jingming Engineering Company, which was responsible for many renowned historic modern structures in the Hankou area. Built in 1921, this six-story reinforced concrete building has a floor area of 3,611 square meters and represents a transitional architectural style between classicism and modernism. In August 1948, a globally shocking case involving the collective assault of Chinese women by U.S. soldiers occurred inside the building. It serves as an important physical artifact for studying local architectural history and conducting patriotic education. (Fifth Batch)

The Jingming Building is a six-story structure designed and built by the Jingming Engineering Company—the most significant foreign-owned architectural firm in Wuhan’s history.

Its design was influenced by the contemporary Modernist movement, featuring a simplified and modern exterior that reduced classical ornamentation, along with a compact interior layout. The façade design adopts a structural expression approach, using columns, beams, and large glass windows to shape the building’s appearance, emphasizing natural indoor lighting. The main entrance is simply designed, with a granite base and granite cladding extending up to the second-floor roof. There are balconies of varying styles and sizes. However, the overall façade maintains vertical and horizontal symmetry—simple, flat, yet staggered, conveying a sense of modern elegance.

The Jingming Engineering Company was founded by Hemings and Bergley, both graduates of the Royal Academy of Arts in London, UK. At the time, Hankou was undergoing a peak in urban construction, and there was a scarcity of engineering and construction talent. Shen Zhusan, the owner of the Hanxiesheng Construction Company, funded the establishment of the Jingming Engineering Company under the condition that all design projects undertaken by Jingming would be constructed by Hanxiesheng.

During its decades in Hankou, the Jingming Engineering Company designed a series of notable modern buildings in Wuhan: the American Citibank, the Yokohama Specie Bank of Japan, the Dafu Bank, the Hankou Electric Light Company, and the Xuan Palace Hotel... These historic buildings still stand today, each considered “immortal.”

It now houses the Wuhan Zhang Xuelian Traditional Medicine Research Institute.

Source: Hubei Provincial Cultural Relics Bureau

Further Reading:

· Fifth Batch of Hubei Provincial Cultural Relics Protection Units