How New Taipei City Was Built and Evolved Over Time

The building here divides sharply between the old hill towns and the modern lowland.

Mining towns on slopes

Jiufen and Jinguashi were built on gradients too steep for streets, so the settlements are organised around stepped stone alleys with houses stacked one above another, roofed in tarred felt that gives the towns their dark, layered look from a distance. Shops open directly onto the steps, and what feels picturesque now was a response to having nowhere flat to build.

Japanese timber

The colonial period left wooden administrative buildings, dormitories and the Crown Prince chalet at Jinguashi — post-and-beam construction with tiled roofs, tatami and sliding screens, several now restored as museums.

Temple carving

Taiwanese temples are among the most elaborately decorated buildings anywhere: swallowtail roof ridges encrusted with jiannian mosaic figures made from broken porcelain, stone columns carved with dragons in deep relief, and painted beams. Sanxia’s Zushi temple took decades and is effectively a sculpture gallery.

The modern districts

Banqiao, Zhonghe and the rest are built in reinforced concrete towers to seismic codes, at very high density, with the covered arcades along the ground floor that Taiwanese cities require against sun and rain.

Arcades

Taiwanese cities require a covered walkway under the first floor of street-facing buildings, a rule inherited from the Japanese period and originally from southern Chinese practice. The result is that you can cross a district in heavy rain without getting wet, and that ground-floor shopfronts open into a shaded public passage rather than onto the pavement.

Fort San Domingo

A Spanish and Dutch fort rebuilt in brick, with a British consular residence beside it.