The Chungking Mansions was built in 1962 as luxury apartments for the middle-class and elites of both western and Chinese culture. In the 1970s, the South Asian population began purchasing apartments and transforming them into business spaces for South Asian and Western merchants. Over time, these apartments were sub-divided and sold off, resulting in the current 920 property owners and over 4000 residents (at any given time). With residential, restaurants, offices and guest-lodges all located possibly on the same floor, the deterioration of the building is due to negligence by the many owners. Negligence by the result of the building having no primary shareholder/ property owner, therefore they cannot keep up with the wear and tear from all the traffic in & out of the building while balancing out who's responsible for fixing what.

Furthermore, the desire for low-cost accommodations by tourists has not only provoked the numerous guest houses, but also has compromised the standard boundaries of comfort. The room dimensions are limited to its furnishings, resulting with rooms from 70sq ft. to 180sq ft. Regardless of size, the low-cost has attracted over 120 nationalities. Many of these visitors take advantage of the visa-free-period entry permit to Hong Kong to conduct trade. As a result there are inhabitants of over 120 nationalities located within this building.

Based upon the understanding above, I created these various diagrams to help understand (sorta) the context of the building, in terms of those who pass through this building.

Hong Kong Visa-Free Periods based upon country.

Percentage of people within the chungking mansion. (figures based upon average statistics of assumption not fully accurate, but gives an idea to those affected by the existance a building of such 'program')

Analysis of the people residing within this building. Information made up but mostly likely holds some sort of accuracy. Plus, how fun would it be if I were not able to make up a story based upon my studies of this building?