Background
Haw Par Mansion is a Grade I Historical building in Hong Kong. In 1936, the Aw brothers who owned the Tiger Balm factories built the mansion to promote their products and Chinese and Buddhist moral education through various statues and murals all around the mansion. In the late 70s, it was a popular place for children to visit. Sadly starting from the 90s, it was no longer a place known amongst younger generations, almost forgotten in time. I learned about this place only when my parents mentioned it for the first time because the mansion is running out of business. More than half of the space was demolished in 2004 and only the main garden and mansion remains.

Objectives
With the support of the HKSAR Government’s Revitalising Historic Buildings through Partnership Scheme, the space has been converted into a music school. Unfortunately, the foundation hasn’t been able to keep the school running. As of the time of recording, the piece of land is 15 days away from being taken back by the government. It is not sure what plans the government has for the place, and it might be the only time it will be opened to the public in the coming years. Although 360 videos of the mansion exist on the internet, the sonic space has never been properly captured. For such a densely populated space as Hong Kong, it is extremely rare to find a large space that retains the Chinese tradition as well as such wondrous architecture. It might as well be the only place in Hong Kong that has this particular spatial configuration, which is reflected through the adoption of Chinese Eclectic style and colonialism influence

Recording
I used the H3-VR paired with a Ricoh Theta 360 camera to capture the outdoor areas of the mansion. The first video was taken from the middle of the garden, with a fountain at the back and surrounding greenery. Birds and sounds of nature can be heard apart from the people talking and the fountain behind. 

The second recording is of the toilet on the side of the mansion. You can hear the sound of the water canal flowing from the hill, below the mansion.

The third outdoor recording is in front of the porch of the mansion. On one side it is simply the main entrance to the mansion that is unfortunately closed off for now; and on the other side is an upper angle to the garden below. Shielded by the bush, there was actually a tiny pond that was currently drained out of water, filled with fallen leaves. A janitor was cleaning the leaves out at the time of recording.

Unfortunately, video recording is not allowed indoors, specifically tripods are not allowed. It’s a shame that I am unable to capture the video at the same time. The first indoor recording is of the only room opened to visitors. It used to be a dining hall with beautiful Italian stained glass on both sides of the room, with decor inspired by Chinese, Burmese and Indian folklore. From the recording you can hear the natural room reverb with the visitors taking in the space.

The second indoor recording was taken on top of a servant’s staircase. It is an interesting space, with a dead end linked to a tiny window that servants used to bring out the food from the kitchen. Opposite to the servant’s staircase, you can see the main staircases linked to the dining room and the visitor entrance. By the extra decoration on the steps you can tell it is the path the masters of the mansion used. During the time of recording, the left side of the servant’s staircase is the office and visitor centre where you can hear a phone ringing and visitors coming from; the right side is the way visitors go up to the dining room.

Post Production 
The 360 video and the ambisonic audio were synced with Premiere Pro. For the indoor recording, I did the best to combine the still panorama images to the spaces recorded to compensate for the videos that were not allowed to be filmed.