For the last thirty years, the Bank of China Tower has been an iconic landmark on Hong Kong’s skyline. Ieoh Ming Pei’s masterpiece has been featured in numerous American blockbusters, as well as in video games like SimCity, a franchise centered on city-building. In fact, unlike the Bank of China Tower, few people outside of Hong Kong would recognize the headquarters of its main competitor, the HSBC Main Building. Yet, in the 1980s, when both skyscrapers were under constructio

In 1934, the Nationalist government of China commissioned the renowned architectural firm Palmer and Turner to design its headquarters in Shanghai, Hong Kong, and Singapore. Construction of the Shanghai headquarters began in 1936. However, the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War in 1937 delayed construction of the new Bank of China branches in Hong Kong and Singapore. Although the war ended in 1945, the Chinese Civil War immediately intensified between the Nationalists a