In the early 1990s, the Kowloon Walled City was, for many years, the most densely populated settlement in the world. Tens of thousands of people lived crammed into a kind of vertical city-state, developed without any building regulations and marked by extremely poor sanitary conditions. It was a labyrinthine space covering just 0.026 square kilometers, shrouded in near-perpetual darkness, home to illicit trades, prostitution, opium dens, and a self-sufficient community of small factories, shops, schools, and medical facilities.
Originally a military outpost during the Song dynasty, Kowloon later became a Chinese enclave within British-controlled Hong Kong, then a refuge for mainland Chinese migrants seeking the protection of the British. By 1947, some 2,000 squatters were already occupying the narrow alleys of a growing shantytown. This “city” without a formal government, demolished in 1994, has since become a punk cultural icon with a gritty, post-apocalyptic charm. Its story, both disturbing and captivating, has long inspired filmmakers, as seen in the 2024 martial arts film Twilight of the Warriors: Walled In.
“Kowloon Walled City: A Cinematic Journey” is the third phase of an immersive exhibition organized by the Hong Kong Tourism Board in collaboration with the government and the creators of Twilight of the Warriors, designed to showcase the fascinating reality of the Kowloon Walled City through the movie’s sets. Presented at the Hong Kong International Airport and the AIRSIDE shopping mall in Kai Tak, the exhibition is now located on the original site of the former Walled City —today home to Kowloon Walled City Park — and will remain open and free to the public for the next three years.
The exhibition is divided into six thematic zones aimed at faithfully recreating daily life inside the city, meticulously reconstructing its environments through the film’s repurposed sets. The barbershop with mosaic tiles and vintage tools, the tea stall, the plastic flower workshop, the winding alleys leading to appliance shops and hidden ceilings, all have been carefully crafted with particular attention to detail and further enhanced by interactive and audio elements that lend authenticity to the installation.