Take photos on the roof of Guangzhou.

Guangzhou is an ancient city with a long history. Many of its buildings are famous all over the country, including arcades.

The arcade is a typical modern commercial building, built between buildings and across the sidewalk. It is an architectural form evolved from the combination of western ancient architecture and traditional culture in southern China. This kind of building is suitable for wet and rainy weather and dense commercial buildings in the south.

The arcade is one of the most distinctive buildings in the southeast coastal towns. Generally, it is divided into three parts: roof, building body and arcade bottom. Mountain flowers and parapets can be seen on the roof of every arcade, and the mountain flowers in the arcade building are the key decorative parts of the roof. The parapets on both sides of the mountain flowers are parapets, which appear on the edge of the roof and above the eaves. The pattern is simple, emphasizing practicality.

The bottom of the arcade is supported by square columns several meters high, and a series of continuous arcade spaces form the sidewalk. In today's increasingly serious traffic noise, these thick square columns have played a certain role in isolating high-frequency noise on the road. In addition, the sight of the column blocks pedestrians walking at the bottom of the arcade and cars running back and forth on the road, making them feel very safe and comfortable when crossing the road.

Guangzhou arcade can be divided into Xiguan arcade and Dongshan arcade according to architectural style.

Xiguan arcade is the representative of early arcade. Its appearance is mainly decorated in baroque style. Most of the designs of mountain flowers and buildings directly have the decorative features of ancient Rome, such as Roman columns and curly patterns, and also incorporate elements of traditional China architecture, such as China's fair-faced bricks for walls, and the overhangs of mountain flowers at the top are also made into arched roofs with China characteristics.

Dongshan arcade was formed a little later than Xiguan arcade, and it tends to be modern and concise. For example, Roman columns have changed from fair-faced brick walls to simple square columns, columns and walls of fine stones and meters, and geometric patterns have increased.

Guangzhou's arcade building art is the highest, and all kinds of decorative styles combining Chinese and western styles are in full bloom. The stone carving, brick carving and color painting of each arcade building are different, which makes Guangzhou rich and colorful.

However, this Guangzhou building with traditional culture was demolished in the early 1990s due to the transformation of the old city. Many arcade buildings on 623 Road, Zhongshan Road and Renmin Road were demolished and destroyed. By the end of 1990' s, the voice of protecting arcades began to ring, and the government took protective measures to preserve them. As a fusion of Chinese and foreign cultures, Guangzhou arcade, as a wonderful flower of Lingnan architecture, shows the times.