Yangon Echoes exposes untold stories of locals living in Yangon’s dilapidated colonial buildings

A photographic book highlights the conflict surrounding the destruction of Yangon’s historic architecture by putting a spotlight on the buildings’ residents.
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Yangon Echoes
Yangon Echoes by Virginia Henderson and photographer Tim Webster
Yangon Echoes
Daw Shwe Yin keeps track of family memories in her home on 50th Street. Her family has lived here for more than 40 years and is now facing pressure to leave.
Yangon Echoes
U Khin Sein in the second floor lounge with his protégé, Aung San. The former tailor has lived here six decades.
Yangon Echoes
U Kyau Kye reads the newspaper in downtown 50th Street. The entire city block has since been demolished in favour of a twelve-storey condominium development.
Yangon Echoes
Daw Tin Tin Nwe and U Aung Htoo have lived on Lower Pazundaung Road for more than 30 years. Their three-room shack accommodates six.
Yangon Echoes
Yangon Echoes tells individual stories of the nameless faces living in Yangon's colonial buildings
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From the Series

There is much debate around the remaining British colonial buildings in Myanmar’s capital city, Yangon. The government wants to make way for modern high-rise constructions, but tenants (some of them squatters) have made these historic buildings their homes.Yangon Echoes is a recently published photographic book, which goes behind the walls of these neglected structures to uncover the individual stories of the nameless faces living there.

Oral historian Virginia Henderson and Australian photographer Tim Webster created the book after interviewing 57 residents occupying various buildings dating back to the early 1900s.

The stories are diverse, ranging from evicted residents camping on the streets to a family-run business operating in an apartment for six decades. Webster’s photographs foreshadow the stark realities these locals are faced with, framing the helpless faces wary of landowners and governing bodies that are making money off of their demise.  

“In some ways the book is quite sad,” Henderson told a local publication. “The heritage in this city is facing huge pressures from many corners.”

Despite the efforts of the Yangon Heritage Trust that is fighting to preserve the architecture, four of the 33 buildings featured in the book have already been demolished and those that are still standing are tied up in legal battles over ownership.