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Statue Square

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Template:Short description Template:Use Hong Kong English Template:Use dmy dates Template:Infobox urban feature Template:Infobox Chinese

File:HK Central 皇后像廣場 Statue Square 前立法會大樓 Legislative Council Building 滙豐銀行總行大廈 HSBC HQ Building 太子大廈 Prince's Building 文華東方酒店 Mandarin Oriental Hotel Aug-2013.JPG
General view of Statue Square in August 2013. The large building overlooking the square is the HSBC Building (fourth design), completed in 1985.
File:Central Circa 1910 IMG 5786 cropped.jpg
Statue Square in the 1910s, with HSBC building (second design). The old City Hall is hidden by the Legislative Council Building.
File:Hong Kong Central in 1930s.JPG
Statue Square in the 1930s, looking south toward the HSBC building (third design, built in 1935). The canopy of Queen Victoria's statue is visible.
File:Hongkong Central 1955 (cropped).jpg
Statue Square in 1955. Prince's Building (first generation) and Queen's Building are visible on the right.
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Statue Square façade of the Legislative Council Building in June 2013.
File:Statue Square Filipina.jpg
Statue Square is a rendezvous for numerous Filipino maids in Hong Kong on Sundays.

Statue Square (Template:Lang-zh; lit. "Empress' Statue Square") is a public pedestrian square in Central, Hong Kong. Built entirely on reclaimed land at the end of the 19th century, Statue Square consists of two parts separated by Chater Road into a northern and a southern section. It is bordered by Connaught Road Central in the north and by Des Voeux Road Central in the south.

The name is a reference to the statues, mainly of British royalty, which stood on the square until the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong during World War II. Today, the only statue on the square is the one of Sir Thomas Jackson, 1st Baronet, an early HSBC banker.

HistoryEdit

The square was built at the end of the nineteenth century on land reclaimed by the Praya Reclamation Scheme. The idea of a square of statues dedicated to royalty was conceived by Sir Catchick Paul Chater.<ref name="ReferenceA">The Statues of Statue Square, Hong Kong by Liz Chater, privately published July 2009</ref> Initially named "Royal Square", it gradually became known as "Statue Square", as it originally contained the statue of Queen Victoria,<ref name="old queen"/><ref name="Wordie2733">Template:Cite book</ref> in commemoration of the Queen's Golden Jubilee in 1887. The statue of the Queen should have been made not in bronze but in marble, an error that was not discovered until the bronze statue was almost completed.<ref name="ReferenceA"/><ref name="old queen">Wordie, Jason. "The square that put an old queen in her place", The Standard, 2 May 1999</ref> It was officially unveiled at the centre of the square on 28 May 1896, the day officially appointed for the celebration of the 77th birthday of the Queen.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

A statue of Sir Thomas Jackson, 1st Baronet, the chief manager of the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation was unveiled in 1906.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Apart from Jackson's statue and the two bronze lions in front of the HSBC building, the rest of the statues were displaced to Japan to be melted by the Japanese occupiers during World War II.

The Cenotaph, a replica of the Cenotaph in Whitehall, London,<ref name="grade I">Brief Information on Proposed Grade I Items, pp. 53–54 Template:Webarchive</ref> was unveiled on 24 May 1923 (Empire Day) by the Governor Sir Reginald Edward Stubbs. It was built on the northeastern section of Statue Square, facing the Hong Kong Club Building.<ref>"1923 Unveiling the Cenotaph", Gwulo: Old Hong Kong website</ref> This area is now only uncommonly referred to as part of Statue Square.

After the war, some of the statues were brought back to Hong Kong. Sir Thomas Jackson's now stands roughly in the middle of the square, facing the Court of Final Appeal Building. Queen Victoria's statue was placed in Victoria Park,<ref name="old queen"/> and the two HSBC lions returned to the front of the HSBC building. The bronze statue of George V, also removed by the Japanese, was lost and never replaced after the war.<ref name="old queen"/>

Since the 1980s, it has been a tradition for thousands of Filipina domestic workers to congregate in and around Statue Square every Sunday, their usual rest day of the week. A parallel tradition has since been developed in Victoria Park for Indonesian domestic helpers in Hong Kong.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Surrounding buildingsEdit

South

The HSBC Hong Kong headquarters building is located along the southern side of the square, across Des Voeux Road Central. The site was previously occupied by the old City Hall (built 1869, demolished 1933) and smaller earlier generations of the HSBC Hong Kong headquarters building.

East
West

Several buildings with names reminiscent of British royalty were built on the western side of the square. Prince's Building and Queen's Building were built directly along the square (southern section and northern section respectively), while the others were built further west.

North

The square was initially bordered by Victoria Harbour on its northern side, but following land reclamation, it is now separated from it by Edinburgh Place, which housed the Star Ferry pier, among others, until 2007.

The statuesEdit

Today, the only freestanding statue on the Square is the statue of Sir Thomas Jackson. Additionally, a 2.7 m high blind-folded statue of Themis, the Greek Goddess of Justice and Law, stands on top of the pediment of the Court of Final Appeal Building,<ref>Legislative Council Website Template:Webarchive</ref> and is facing the Square. The statues that have been historically on display on the square include:

In addition, statues of royalty and colonial administrators located outside of Statue Square included:

In popular cultureEdit

This location was the "Pit Stop" for the tenth episode of The Amazing Race 17.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

GalleryEdit

See alsoEdit

ReferencesEdit

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External linksEdit

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