Reimagining early public life: space syntax and spatial formation of teahouses in modern China

As a culturally constructed paradigm of distinctive everyday life, the “Jiangnan teahouse” myth has persisted. This study investigates 46 teahouses within the context of market town dynamics, revealing how their publicness emerged through the erosion of domestic boundaries and the absence of formal public institutions. A space syntax approach mixed with GIS, K-means clustering, and ANOVA analysis was developed based on the selected representative study case of Shengze Town (Jiangsu, China). The study concludes that four distinct spatial typologies can be identified based on a clustering analysis of 46 teahouses, with 28.2% situated in areas of higher integration and visibility and functioning as core social nodes, whereas the remaining 71% primarily serve localised community functions. The interior analysis reveals that visual and spatial control – facilitated by corridors and other traditional fixtures (e.g. laohuzao) – subtly mediates publicness between domestic and commercial realms. From an external viewpoint, the reconstructed routes of carnival parades reveal that the teahouses acted as panoramic devices that diffuse publicness in symbolic collective activities. This study contributes to bridging the epistemological divide between two distinct academic discourses on the public sphere and public space.