Walking Through Hong Kong Campuses — Architectural Notes of a New Media Student
When Fu Gang enrolled in the Master of Arts in New Media and Social Media programme at the Education University of Hong Kong (EdUHK), he imagined himself as little more than an observer. He noted the layered geometry of dormitories, the speckled sunlight in corridors, the murmur of library discussion. These fragments—posted online almost casually—found an audience. Readers recognised themselves in his notes, and eventually a publisher did too. The result was a book: not an architectural treatise, but a travelogue of “fieldwork by foot.” After all, why should only architects be entrusted with the emotions of architecture?
EdUHK, perched on a hillside, became his muse. The dormitory outside the library windows resembles colourful building blocks, while the flame trees at the entrance plaza blaze in summer like clouds aflame. The university’s international standing in education lends weight to its reputation, yet Fu’s chapter reads as both a love letter to his alma mater and a guide for those considering it.
The dormitories proved the most surprising. Expecting simple and plain, Fu was taken aback by the Jockey Club Student Quarters: balconies staggered like piano keys across the slope, glowing at dusk like a hive alive with light. The image remains one of the book’s most indelible.
He singled out five corners of EdUHK for his readers: the plaza before the library, poised between stillness and movement; the D Block corridor, where architecture yields to nature; staircases painted in bright colours; the A Block entrance platform, offering a rare view of Tsz Shan Monastery; and the fourth floor of the library, a retreat both scholarly and secret. Each, he suggests, is not merely a site of learning but a stage for life.
His training in the new media sharpened his sense of audience. Rather than listing strategies, he asked what readers truly wished to know. He divided his survey of six universities into six modules: architecture, paths, culture, history, life scenes, and libraries — and tucked in “Easter eggs”, such as a campus check-in map for those inclined to follow his footsteps. Interaction, he realised, is the essence of new media.
Fu once worried his writing lacked professional rigour. His editor reassured him: readers do not seek jargon, but feeling. And so he left a message for future students: “A campus is not only a place to study, but a brave laboratory of life. The meaning of studying abroad is not just to obtain a degree, but to broaden one’s horizons.”
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Walking Through Hong Kong Campuses — Architectural Notes of a New Media Student
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