Asian Cultural Heritage Conservation: Cholon’s Heritage Resources in Vietnam’s Transformation

Saigon was founded by the army commander Nguyen Huu Canh in the seventeen century. It became the capital of the French colony of Cochin-China in 1883, part of French Indochinese Union which lasted until 1945, and the capital of the Republic of Vietnam (South Vietnam) until 1975. It has diverse cultural characteristics and a unique urban form. It was described as ‘the pearl of the Far East’, ‘the door to Far East Asia’, ‘the Oriental Paris’ (Guillaume, 1985) during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. After the unification of the North and South Vietnam in 1975, Saigon was renamed Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC). Within the context of the ‘Asian Century’, Asia’s rapid growth and urbanization have transformed global commodity markets and Asian societies where millions of people have migrated from rural areas to the cities thereby increasing the urban population. The rapid transformation of HCMC’s economy in the last two decades is one of the success stories of Asia. The transformation of this economic Centre brought about tangible and intangible cultural changes at central places. A conservation plan has been drawn up in the past, such as Cholon town (2012), but this has not led to the conservation project to protect ‘the spirit’ of Saigon and Cholon, which had been considerably as the original cities in the past of HCMC. This paper, therefore, aims to re-assess cultural significance of old Cholon thematically to support action plans towards sustainable conservation in globalization context. It pays more attention to the district No. 5 as an important part of the inner city and is the location of many ancient historic places such as Gia Dinh region and Cholon (Chinatown), which date from the seventeen century and display characteristic architectural and urban features of the period. To deal with this issue, it is urgent that action is taken immediately to protect Ho Chi Minh City’s surviving built heritage.