Characters of place of protest and place of celebration : case study in Hong Kong

Abstract

The recent large-scale protests in Hong Kong have attracted worldwide attention. Meanwhile celebrations and commemorations in Hong Kong have taken place as usual everyday life. Festivals and anniversaries and other every day public local traditions are enlivening the city without the same exposure to the world media. Both set of events have had a profound impact on urban space and civic life. However, previous urban design studies have not focused on the characteristics of these events space, but only studied the evolution of a single case often viewed though sociological lenses. This study makes an inventory of the public space of protests and celebrations to compare and contrast their urban characters using a case study method research strategy. This study finds the space(s) and time(s) overlap between everyday, celebration and protest; compares the vernacular and top-down-designed symbolic space; explores the interaction between spatial character and human behaviors in the protests and celebrations; and summarizes the characters of places and activities.