Baochao Hutong Invisible Yard / DAGA Architects

Disappeared memoryThe hutong in Beijing is not only a lifestyle but also the memory of many people's childhood. With the process of modernization and urbanization, many people have moved out of the hutong, but the feelings of hutong life remain in one’s memory forever. Time has left the mark on buildings, old houses, rotten pillars, and overgrown yards. Hutong's lifestyle has been "passively" disappeared in the process of urban development. This kind of passivity leads to the disorder of people's memory, as if childhood memories are still yesterday, but today they are already living in modern buildings, and the estrangement between people and buildings is increasing. How to reappear this passive concealment, return history and beautiful memories, and combine the updated architecture with the natural environment to produce a dialogue between history and the present? it is a problem that we have been trying to explore at the beginning of the renovation of this hutong house.