Much has been said about preserving our heritage buildings in and around the Kinta Valley. But alas, profit always seem to over ride conservation efforts.
The following photos (taken this afternoon) is yet another incident whereby pre-war shop houses are forced to make way for more modern structures….
One of our local dailies covered this story too. I’m sure some of you would have seen the demolition taking place – along Anderson Road (Jalan Raja Musa Aziz).
Warned that something was “up” in Gopeng Road I dropped by this afternoon. But nothing was “up” however – quite the opposite – No 62 was on the way “down”.
Yes, the Ipoh demolition team were at it again. So I dropped in on the Chinese foreman who seemed to agree with me that it was a terrible shame, but a job is a job! Well, the front still looked pretty OK.
But the back is a different story, where work is well advanced, both inside and out.
Then I noticed the left hand end and from inside saw this beautiful round room with open air designs to the garden and wondered why they had left it intact. Could they be going to rebuild and not demolish after all?
And I wondered – is this the second Iversen building to be destroyed in less than one week or do the owners have some other plan? What do you think?
Iris Cheng posted on our FB timeline this very sad picture of the Art Deco Majestic Theatre in the throes of demolition. We heard about it on Saturday but honestly I found it too depressing to bother to go and take a photograph. However as Iris did bother I felt it was only right that I should publish it here for those of you who do not follow us on Facebook.
I fear that before too long we shall have nothing left that actually has any traditional architectural styles to please the eye. But perhaps I am that voice in the wilderness – the dinosaur that refuses to lie down. I make no apologies for that and believe that one day the people might understand why I think like that.
This photograph taken by Wang Shaoming just a few months ago shows the row of 1930’s shophouses at what I like to think of as the far end of Fair Park. They look dilapidated, but with the curved end did display a certain character of their own and one wonders why the owners did not tidy them up ( a steam clean and coat of paint would have helped) rrather than leave them deteriorating. But as the next picture shows the reason is clear – They were planned for demolition!
Taken today this shows the back of the buildings and I am sure we shall be privileged to see more photos of this and other happenings around Ipoh over the coming weeks. Keep up the good work Shaoming.