'Concrete stories' is a collection of genuine instants from the daily life of Hong Kong's inhabitants, more particularly of people from the older districts of Kowloon. This peninsula has a population of over 2 millions people and a density of 43,000/km2, which might make it the densest urban area in the world. The vernacular culture of people living in such an extremely urbanised environment can be discovered through all these small stories that are forming a bigger one, a record of how people make use of available space in a cramped city where each square feet can be sold at stratospheric prices.

This series is a testimony of the lifestyle in these old buildings where the rooftop is usually not locked and accessible by all inhabitants. Such rooftops are a little bit like courtyards but in the air. Nowadays, these buildings are disappearing at a fast pace given the scarcity of lands which forces the authority to pull down all the low-rise buildings in order to leave space to taller and more modern ones where rooftop are either totally unaccessible or well-secured to be accessed only by their owner. And since these new buildings are made with luxury finishing, they drive the property prices up making it unaffordable for humble people to remain in the district they used to live in.

Romain HK is a photographer based in Hong Kong. Since 2011 he has been working on several photographic projects depicting this city mainly focusing on extreme urbanization, local heritage and the relationship between city and nature. Previous publications are: ‘Vertical Horizon’ (2012, 2014 and 2017), ‘Wild Concrete’ (2014) and ‘The Blue Moment’ (2016). 'Concrete Stories' is the artist's fourth book.

Romain JL's work has been extensively featured in major publications across the world (The Guardian, National Geographic, Huffington Post, CNN, Wall Street Journal, El Pais, Le Figaro Magazine, Die Welt and Apple Daily and many more...)

The artist is represented by Blue Lotus Gallery in Hong Kong. For more info on the artist and available prints, please click here.

《天台故事》是香港居民，尤其是來自於九龍舊區的居民，在日常生活中真實情況的一個整合。這個半島的人口超過200萬，密度為 43,000/km2，可能是世界上人口最密集的城市地區之一。生活在這樣的一個極端城市化環境，居民的本土文化通過種種日常小事組成一個更大的故事；在這個每平方英尺以極高價格出售的地區，記錄他們如何在狹窄的城市善用其屋頂的空間。這見證了居民在老舊建築物內的生活方式，他們可以自由地走上屋頂，而這些屋頂就像空中花園一樣開放予整棟樓宇的居民使用。但由於土地短缺問題迫使，如今這些建築物正在快速地消失，當局正在一步步拆除這些低樓層建築，以便將空間留予更高、更現代的住宅興建。加上大部分新建住宅都以豪華裝修製成，使出身較卑微的人們無法負擔得起。因此，這種曾經很受基層歡迎的城市區域正在被清空，居民被迫搬遷至郊區生活。《天台故事》的所有照片都採用極端的垂直格式呈現，以突顯在這些區域所感受到的壓迫感。