Feng shui as a Chinese Mediating Strategy: A Spatial and Semantic Analysis of Sino-Western Hybridity in the Tianjin Postal Museum

This study investigates the mobilization of traditional Chinese feng shui principles as an active mediating strategy in the localization of Western architectural forms during the late Qing period, with a focused case study on the Tianjin Postal Museum. It explores how feng shui concepts were translated into spatial, functional, and decorative decisions to produce a distinct Sino-Western hybridity. A mixed-methods approach was employed, integrating archival research, on-site measurement and mapping—using UAV imagery and precision field surveys—along with spatial-semantic analysis to translate architectural elements into interpretable spatial language. The results indicate that while the museum exhibits Western structural and ornamental systems, its overall organization is governed by Chinese spatial rationales, including an enclosed courtyard, a north-south zoning of dynamic and static areas, an axis-based narrative, and strategically repositioned elements such as an octagonal tower and parapet. These were semantically repurposed to regulate Qi, mitigate inauspicious alignments, and adhere to ritual and status conventions. The study concludes that feng shui functioned not as superstition but as a pragmatic spatial framework, enabling Chinese agents to appropriate and adapt Western forms to serve indigenous spatial logic and social functions, thereby creating a “third space” of localized modernity. The research contributes theoretically by bridging spatial-semantic analysis with hybridity theory, and methodologically by combining quantitative architectural proportions with qualitative semantic interpretation to uncover cultural negotiation in architectural form.