Dormitory Common Area

The common area of Seika Dormitory sits empty under light that barely clears the grime-filmed windows. Paint has lifted from the walls in sheets, curling where the plaster beneath has given way. Dust lies across every flat surface. The room holds nothing now except what decay has left behind. The building that contained this space was constructed in 1927 by the Gakuso Foundation, a body affiliated with the Taiwan Governor-General's Office, on 3,100 square metres of national land in Kohinata, Bunkyo-ku, central Tokyo. It was built to house Taiwanese students studying in Japan during the colonial period, reinforced concrete on three storeys above ground with a basement level below. Originally called 高砂寮 (Takasago-ryō), it was renamed 清華寮 (Seika-ryō) in 1946, after Japan's colonial administration of Taiwan had ended. The building kept functioning long after the purpose it was built for had disappeared. The Gakuso Foundation dissolved, the political arrangements that created it collapsed, and ownership of the dormitory fell into a decades-long dispute between Japan, Taiwan and China that no government moved to resolve. Through it all, residents continued to live there, paying approximately ¥8,000 a month in rent, sharing utilities, holding on. In July 2007, a fire broke out and destroyed approximately 70 per cent of the building. Two residents died. Around 40 people were displaced. The Kanto Finance Bureau sealed what remained, and the building stood that way for nearly six years. When Brett Patman photographed Seika Dormitory across two visits in 2012, it had been sealed since the fire. The common area seen here preserves that interval: windows unwashed, paint falling from the walls, light reaching the floor through glass that nobody had reason to clean. The building was demolished in 2013. The site reopened in 2019 as グランヴィ小日向 (Grand Vie Kohinata), a residential aged care facility with 122 rooms.