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Architecture is a demonstration of the tradition, the history and/or the culture of the people and the community for which is was designed and constructed for.

With the coming and going of generations of human life, the built environment in which those people lived become the one remaining facet that continues to tell the history of their heritage for years to come.  The foundations and structures of a culture's architecture are capable of remaining unchanged throughout time as an icon or a symbol of what occurred in the past.  In order for these structures to do so, it is the obligation of the modern day community to ensure that these architectural snippets of a time long gone are preserved so that future generations can learn and understand their own background.

Hong Kong, SAR, is a city on the southern coast of China with a population of approximately seven million people living within 430 sq. miles.  For 99 years, Great Britain's traditions and influences encouraged Hong Kong to grow into a multicultural city that could not be defined by the heritage of one country alone.  However, in the 13 years since the Handover Ceremony of 1997, when Hong Kong was officially returned to the government of China, signs of the colony's transitions have gradually become eradicated from the built environment of the city.  Although Hong Kong is still being defined by it's unique situation of being an integral part of "one country, [with] two systems", as we have continued to be run by a federal system unlike that of Mainland China, it is the small, everyday aspects of the built environment that used to act as reminders of our joint history entwined with that of the United Kingdom that have slowly, but surely, been erased from the face of the city of Hong Kong.  The old Hong Kong currency, the red post boxes arbitrarily located on various street corners, the previously existent navy blue uniforms of police officers patrolling the streets, all of which, alongside the governmental establishments and police stations themselves in the Central District, were adorned with the crowned crest of the British monarchy, now only exist in the memories of those who lived during the colonization period or are otherwise sparsely selected to be displayed in the Heritage Museum of Hong Kong.  While attempts have been made to preserve the built past, many proposals and movements to fight for the survival of cultural landmarks have failed and more and more pieces of the region's multicultural past has been destroyed.  This is especially true with the growing trend of western architects setting their sights on building their large-scale projects in the fast-growing commercial development of China.  So much focus has been placed on "progressing" into becoming bigger, better and more visually expensive, very little to no energy is being spent on maintaining structures that would educate the youth about where this progression sprung from.  It is up to the current generation of architects and historians to ensure that this trend does not continue and that historic structures are allowed, and even helped, to endure and remain a symbol of the past that made Hong Kong the Special Administrative Region that it is today.  The architectural language of government establishments and landmarks of authority and importance need to act, not only as federal buildings of function, but also as symbols that demonstrate the multicultural history that makes Hong Kong unique and exceptional; not just a place of modernization and change, but one rich with facets of time and place: of culture.