Moller Mansion (Hengshan Male Bieshu)

Frommer's Review

Garish, hideous, and mesmerizing at the same time, this gigantic gingerbread mansion (at Yan'an Zhong Lu in the northwest corner of the French Concession) is hard to take your eyes off. An eclectic mix of architectural styles from faux Gothic to Tudor, this mansion of brown-tiled steeples, gables, and spires was built by a Swedish shipping magnate Eric Moller in 1936, so the apocryphal story goes, for his daughter who envisioned the house in a dream, a version since debunked by the daughter herself. Whatever the genesis, the flamboyant house, with its marble pillars, chandeliers, dark wood paneling, and beautiful stained glass windows epitomized the excesses of colonial Shanghai. Previously closed to the public in its incarnation as the headquarters of the Shanghai Communist Youth League, the mansion has been restored and is now an overpriced boutique hotel. Unfortunately, the restoration included the addition of several ugly imitation buildings in the back. Whatever was said about the original mansion, it was at least that: original.

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