Wonderland Villas – a tale of HK’s property rollercoaster

Hilltop area: People walking past a building in the Wonderland Villas hilltop residential complex in the Kwai Fong district of Hong Kong. – AFP

HONG KONG: Red-whiskered bulbuls start chirping around 5am at Wonderland Villas, a hilltop complex in leafy northern Hong Kong whose own history charts the city’s political, economic and social fortunes.

Built in 1984, the year colonial power Britain signed an agreement to hand Hong Kong back to China, the complex was one of the pioneering designs of its time, a cluster of 22 curvaceous white apartment blocks complete with clubhouse, tennis courts and swimming pool.