The Cross-Border Spread and Modernization of Modern Treaty Ports Cities: The Jardine Matheson Warehouse of Tianjin

Modern Chinese treaty port cities were influenced by Western culture, particularly European culture, and their modern architecture witnessed cross-border communication. Considering the technology and construction of the Jardine Matheson Company’s warehouse in the modern treaty port of Tianjin as an example, this paper aims to clarify the process of communication, mutual cultural learning and the localization of modern architecture from the perspectives of architectural technology and construction innovation. It aims to demonstrate a close cross-border interaction between treaty port cities and Europe during the nineteenth-twentieth century. Through the analyses of original archives in both China and the UK, this paper firstly explores the history and building technology of its warehouse of the Jardine Matheson in Tianjin, and traces the origin of flat slab floors in Europe and their transfer to East Asia. Secondly, it analyzes the cross-border spread and modernization of building technology in treaty port cities. The history of this technological transformation and evolution concludes the unique development route and driving force behind architectural technology and culture of modern treaty port cities in East Asia with Tianjin as a case study. Further, it argues that during East Asia's modernization, the factors of imperialism, capitalism, and nationalism played different roles and showed different degrees of interrelation, promotion, and balance. They are the driving forces of modernization and their influence spread from treaty port cities to a broader range of inland cities, which had a long-term and far-reaching influence on East Asia's urban development and construction.