Daxi Old Street

Daxi Old Street, highly renowned domestically, primarily encompasses three historical street blocks: Heping Road, Zhongshan Road, and Central Road. Not only is it large in scale, but its architectural appearance and archway facades are also remarkably well-preserved. It is a commercial street formed by storefronts, and its architectural style is identical to early traditional Taiwanese commercial streets, all featuring "street-house" (jie-wu) style, which are long, narrow-fronted, deep-set, terraced shop-houses. Around 1919, due to the Japanese Governor-General's Office implementing "urban improvement" (shiku kaisei), which was equivalent to modern urban planning, some buildings along Heping Road, Zhongshan Road, and other streets were demolished according to planned building lines. Contemporary residents then used elaborate archway facades to decorate their doorways, with each household vying to outdo the others in splendor, creating a fashionable trend at the time. Typically, residential homes primarily feature red-brick archway facades paired with red-brick houses, while shops showcase Baroque-style archways, pillars, and intricate, ornate relief carvings, all meticulously crafted from stone. What is truly remarkable is that despite the decline of river transport and the changes in prosperity, these three old streets have managed to retain their original appearance. Under the promotion of "community revitalization," Zhongshan Road and Heping Road have once again breathed new life into the old street architecture, combining it with Daxi's other cultural and historical charms, allowing the Daxi area to regain its past glory.