ARCHIVE № 046

Blackstone Apartments

One of Shanghai's earliest luxury apartments for foreign residents, completed in 1924 and now revived as the Blackstone M+ music quarter

Completed in 1924, the Blackstone Apartments were among the earliest luxury apartment houses in Shanghai built expressly for the city's foreign residents. After serving as offices of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration and later as ordinary housing, the building was revived in 2020 as the Blackstone M+ music quarter, open to the public.

Former names: Huaqi ('American') Apartments, Fuxing Apartments

Hand-drawn elevation of Blackstone Apartments

The record

Completed: 1924
Developer: 宋合理 James Harry Blackstone（1879-1965，美国传教士出身的在华投资人）
Style: Eclecticism with Baroque decorative features
Structure: Reinforced-concrete structure (some sources say brick-and-concrete; accounts differ)
Storeys: 6 storeys (one account: 5 when built, one added in 1981)
Type: Apartment Building
District: Xuhui
Address: 1331 Middle Fuxing Road
Historic area: Hengshan–Fuxing Roads Historic Area
Heritage listing no.: 4D012
Coordinates: 31.212843, 121.447825

Shanghai Heritage ArchitectureBatch 4 · Listed 2005

Timeline

1924
Apartments completed
The apartment hotel financed by James Harry Blackstone was completed — one of the earliest luxury apartments in Shanghai built expressly for foreign residents.
1935
Xiong Xiling and Mao Yanwen make their home here
After their wedding, the couple set up their new home in Room 36 on the third floor, an episode preserved in the pages of Shen Bao.
1949
Foreign residents depart; renamed Fuxing Apartments
As foreign residents left Shanghai, the building passed to the Xuhui District housing authorities and was officially renamed 'Fuxing Apartments.'
1981
An additional storey
One storey was added on top, giving the building its present six-storey form.
2005
Listed as Heritage Architecture
The Blackstone Apartments were designated in the fourth batch of Shanghai's Heritage Architecture.
2020
'Blackstone M+' opens
Conservation work was completed and the ground floor opened as a music-themed cultural quarter, free to the public.

Uses over time

Historic uses: Luxury apartments for foreign residents (1924-1949)
UNRRA offices and residential housing (c. 1945-1980s)
Ordinary housing (1980s-2016)
Today: The ground floor houses the 'Blackstone M+' music quarter (with a bookshop, café, exhibitions and other spaces free to the public); the upper floors remain in office and residential use

Visiting

Open to the public

The ground-floor public cultural spaces (bookshop, exhibitions and more) are open to visitors; the residential and office floors above are not open to the public

Blackstone Apartments
Middle Fuxing Road
Baroque ornamentation
music-themed space
adaptive reuse of heritage buildings

FIRST EDITION · VOLUME ONE

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