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For those interested in design, crafts, and lifestyle “Made in Hong Kong,” the best place to go is the PMQ in the heart of SoHo. Two blocks, each with eight floors, are occupied by numerous galleries, shops, cafés, and pop-up stores. The PMQ is a revitalisation project in which aspiring designers and artists can lease retail space in a prime location for slightly less than the local rent.
Despite the conversion of the PMQ, the premises still manages to convey the lives of the police officers and their families who used to live there.
Info
Address 35 Aberdeen Street, Central | Public Transport MTR Island Line (blue), Sheung Wan Station, Exit B or E1, with the tram to Central and Jubilee Street and then take the escalator up to Hollywood Road | Hours Daily: 7am–11pm| Tip The Police Married Quarters was erected on the site of the former Queen’s College, built in 1862 and school to many historical figures. You can still see remnants in the basement.
At the end of World War II the police force still consisted primarily of British and Indian men (India had been colonialised by the British 100 years earlier and the Indians had already been qualified for the job). Due to the waves of refugees and a high population growth, the police force had to be expanded to cope. To interest more Chinese people in the police service, from the 1960s the government started to construct family accommodation like the Police Married Quarters, built in 1951.
The PMQ was designed for 168 families and was the first in a whole series of similar housing projects. The more children a family had, the easier it was to get an apartment. The large rooms had a balcony in the rear and an adjacent toilet. Separated by the verandah facing the courtyard each apartment had its own fully equipped kitchen, nowadays used as store rooms. The spacious covered outdoor areas in between, in which the designers today exhibit their goods, were communal areas. For this reason, the families lived as close social community - they helped each other, celebrated together on the verandas, where they also played mahjong, dried their laundry, chatted, and the children played. Their fathers would be home early because the Central Police Station was right around the corner – living conditions most people today could only dream of.
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