extremely expensive real estate on touristy 国子箭, a museum on the first floor of the back courtyard, all preserved architecture, commercial space now available. not really ‘home’ enough for our project purposes, and ridiculously expensive, but was recommended by Jia Wei, and it’s close by, so good to check out anyway… the roof terrace made me 流口水 though… 30,000 rmb/month for all the front yard spaces (can be rented separately too), and 60,000 rmb/month  for the back, not including the museum part (that stays)

very tiny hutong off of Gulou, with an impressive view of the Bell tower from the courtyard. square meterage could be good enough, with the twist that it’s long and rectangular, not square. posh, posh, posh. father’s daughter shows us around, densely throwing around the details of the imported materials used for this space, now being used as her studio. To paraphrase: “But now I spend half the year in Beijing and half the year abroad–the U.S., England, and in July I go to New Zealand–so we decided to rent it out, but I won’t rent it out to just anyone. I’m picky about who’s in my place. There was this French guy that was interested but I said no, he was too ugly. I’m an artist, aesthetics are important. And they have to be clean. So actually designers are better than artists. Not as messy like me, I’m an artist.” 30,000 RMB/month

had walked into this place once when it was a restaurant, meals for around 900 RMB a person. quite big, at least 300 sq metres or more, super high ceiling is nice. but not very homey, courtyard is small, divided into two sections. just off Xihai, great location. 30,000 rmb/month.

the courtyard here is not big enough, maybe around 30-40 square meters, and i asked the landlord if it would be possible to tear one small room down to make the courtyard bigger, but she said it’s bad fengshui. i said my friend needs to 排练 there, and she said she should 排练 indoors! one side of the rooms is opened up to make a very big, long room, probably at least 70 sq meters, and if you’re interested to concentrate on this play between inside-and-out, it could work… there’s no furniture really, since it was used as an office before, but the would-be bedroom part is also nice because it has the traditional wood framing (middle photo). kitchen big, and huge bathroom (the part that i thought could be torn down). there’s also another small toilet. ~18,000 RMB/month

quite nice, but more pricey. also heated floors and chandeliers! courtyard is borderline in size (30-40 sq. meters?), but everything is in really good condition, homey. 30,000 RMB/month.

this the more 80s view of courtyard life in Beijing: not newly renovated, currently lived in, it’s super worn-in. a small, modest entrance opens to a very long corridor before you come into the courtyard, also borderline in size. one large room off the corridor, and then in the courtyard, rooms at the north, east and west. 18,000 RMB/month

here’s the place to give us some serious things to think about… needs some work, but it’s super cheap and other reasons i will go into further when we speak next… around 260 sq. metres, courtyard must be around 50 sq. metres. rooms on the northern, southern and eastern sides. a cellar below…