Grand Plans for Villa Victoria at Pui O Lantau Resulted in a Dreary Dilapidated Dive

If you’ve been along Chi Ma Wan Road in Pui Wo, you’ve surely noticed a big, grubby white building just east of the playground at the junction with the road to the beach. It’s like a chunky rectangular block, with a “concertina” style black metal gate leading to a driveway and parking lot.

Even when new, it was never pretty, but nowadays [late 2025] it’s rather grim – with an almost abandoned look, some of the large windows smashed, perhaps by typhoon damage. There’s a black Mercedes car here, with flat tyres, a missing fuel tank cap, and all windows smashed to smithereens – with a brick below the rear window helping suggest the damage wasn’t by typhoons, but humans. I’ve posted about this place on Facebook, with replies including it being so creepy looking, it rather recalls the Overlook Hotel in The Shining.

Yet I also learned there’s a webpage showing this building was supposed to look marvellous, magnificent, even palatial, and somehow set in a coastal area with headlands recalling the northeast England coast in view on one side, an expansive grassy area to the side, and splendid buildings akin to the grandest sector of Berlin on the other side.

“Classical and marvelous”

If you’re curious to see the literally incredible, impossible artist’s impression, visit this page Villa Victoria. Here, you can learn:

The main building under construction features French court style, which was designed by a famous French architect Dominique Hertenberger. It is integrated into the nature, and is classical and marvelous.

I’ve emailed the architect; no reply as yet.

Behind the scenes – via the page source code – there is a little more info, including:

Overlooking sea view of Pui O Bay, it is surrounded by the hills, and home to many outstanding people. It is the peerless good resort in Hong Kong. From Villa Victoria to Hong Kong International Airport there is only 15 minutes ride.

That could be a scarily fast ride, averaging around 60km/hr for the 14km journey!

As to the image, it turns out via a quick Google Lens search that this coastline is not in England, but is California’s Big Sur, and is on Flickr here: Highway 1

I also tried searching for the buildings at right; Google AI gave: “The building in the image is the headquarters of the Instituto Cervantes in Madrid, Spain.” But the images via Google differ a little. Anyway, they are not remotely akin to Pui O buildings!

The ambitious Mr Ni

Property developer Ni Zhaoxing’s Shanghai office is dotted with the status symbols of China’s new rich: Antiques and art, such as carved jade, crystal and contemporary paintings. His headquarters in Zhong Rong International Business City–a complex named after his Zhong Rong Group–is one of three sites Ni snapped up in the financial district during a market bust starting in the late 1990s. The subsequent rebound put him, with $190 million, at number 188 on forbes’ list of the wealthiest Chinese last year.

Crude Ambition

The would-be developer was the Zhongrong Group, established in China by Ni Zhaoxing, who seems to be an interesting gentleman. A Forbes article on him begins:

As the article indicates, no one could accuse Ni of lacking chutzpah; and it turns out that Villa Victoria is not the only project that had seemed impressive in initial plans, but didn’t work out quite so well. Or in one case, didn’t work out at all. Back in 2013, there were reports from the UK on a highly ambitious idea to recreate the Crystal Palace in London. For instance

An art-loving Chinese billionaire today unveiled his plans to recreate the Crystal Palace as a £500m cultural attraction to replace the glass and steel Victorian building that once captivated the world.

Ni Zhaoxing, a property developer, used a launch event in the grounds of the south London park where the original Crystal Palace burnt down in 1936 to reveal his goal of building a “jewel in the crown for Britain and the world” to employ 2,000 people.

A new Crystal Palace? Chinese billionaire reveals plan to replace London’s glass wonder

Just a year later, this new Crystal Palace didn’t even amount to a hill of beans:

10 months on, no winner has been selected and the project seems to have stalled.

Crystal Palace: Where did it all go Zhongrong?

Villa Victoria built, painted, spell as Victoria Resort – and left to decay

As you can see, Villa Victoria was built, though without any of the Neoclassical outer decor in the artist’s impression. Nor, of course, with a terraformed coastline or grand buildings added behind it.

BUT in March 2016 – in between the above two photos being taken – there was a court case between the building contractor, Chee Cheung Hing and Company, as plaintiff; and developer Zhong Rong International, as defendant. As outlined here, the former had gone ahead with the work despite no contract being signed; and was seeking the original tender price rather than a subsequent lower sum:

The Plaintiff commenced proceedings against the Defendant, claiming that it had submitted a tender for works to be carried out (“Works”) at a development in Lantau Island (“Tender”), for the price of approximately HK$57 million. The Tender price was subsequently reduced to HK$51.6 million. The Plaintiff claims that despite the Defendant’s issue of a letter of intent dated 5 April 2012 (“Letter of Intent”), and despite the reference in the Tender to the Main Contract to be entered between the Plaintiff and the Defendant for the Plaintiff’s execution of the Works, no contract had been signed by the Defendant. The Plaintiff therefore seeks in these proceedings a declaration that the parties had not entered into any contract for the execution of the Works, and that the Plaintiff is entitled to payment of a sum of HK$55.8 million (instead of the revised Tender price of HK$51.6 million), as the reasonable value of the Works actually carried out by the Plaintiff in respect of the development.

Chee Cheung Hing & Co Ltd v Zhong Rong International (Group) Ltd

By June 2016, the Hong Kong courts had “ordered that the court proceedings be stayed and the matter be referred to arbitration“.

And that, perhaps, was that as far as the case was concerned: it seems it remains in limbo.

For at least a short time, the “villa” operated as tourist accommodation, named Victoria Resort. It still appears on multiple websites if you search; and photos can make it look pretty good inside, as at: Victoria Resort. Yet these are perhaps like ghost pages, with outdated info; and a response to a Facebook page suggests that by 2025 the building hosted only squatters, who were maybe travellers known as “begpackers”.

So, a sorry state of affairs.

Sorriest of all, really: the project occupied land that used to host feral water buffaloes, birds and more, right by a designated Coastal Protection Area that was supposedly protected to safeguard scenery and wildlife, and in 2024 was rezoned to become part of the South Lantau Coast Regulated Area (see APPROVED SOUTH LANTAU COAST OUTLINE ZONING PLAN NO. S/SLC/23). It seems destined to remain a huge affront to these planning principles, even as it continues decaying, as a sort of monument to grandiloquent notions that were always doomed to fail.