Before Hong Kong’s open-up, Wan Chai had only dozens of inhabitants who lived out of quarrying. After that, however, it caught the eyes of Lancelot Dent, tai-pan of Dent & Co., and the site was thought of as a potential commercial base with its river and bay, hence water resource and maritime shelter. Having won the bid over the coastal lots of Wan Chai, Dent started to strengthen the waterfront, and it was with this effort that the land between Queen’s Road East and Johnston Road was formed.

Dent put up a lot of structures — large-scale dockyard for his fleet, warehouse, office, the palatial tai-pan mansion “Spring Garden”, workers’ dormitory, etc. — on the Wan Chai waterfront to oil the wheels of his giant commercial and financial empire, not to mention the buoyant opium trade. At that time, the Dent’s fleet mostly sailed between Wan Chai and Xiamen (Amoy), as well as Shantau (Swatow); the two ports were also where the Dent’s workers, who clustered in Wan Chai, mostly came from. That accounts for the future birth of Amoy Street and Swatow Street at the site of the former Dent’s dockyard.

In 1897, Chater turned his hand to the eastern coast (i.e. Wan Chai) while the Central District reclamation he brought forth was still in progress. He proposed a similar reclamation at the site, but as it involved demolishing the Royal Naval Hospital, then in Wan Chai, it was disapproved by the military. The project was put off until 1921 when the navy decided to move the hospital to Stonecutters Island.