Urban architecture and landscape of Saigon - Cho Lon past and present: Town Hall building - Continental Hotel

In the 1870s, about 10 years after the French arrived in Saigon and Cochinchina, French civilians from the mother country who came to work for the French government or to do business often had to stay temporarily in places like the Favre Hotel on Catinat Street, but because of high demand, there was a shortage of space.

Mr. Pierre Cazeau, a businessman and contractor, built a hotel opposite the Favre Hotel called the Continental. The hotel partly met the accommodation needs of a city that was beginning to develop. At the end of the 19th century, for a while this building (now the Continental Hotel) was used as the city hall where the mayor had his office, before the city hall (now the City People's Committee) was built. Before that, the mayor's office was located in a room in the building of Mr. Vuong Thai (a wealthy Cantonese businessman), which is now the Customs building at the corner of Ham Nghi and Nguyen Hue streets. The bookstore of Mr. FHSchneider, a pioneer in printing books and newspapers in Cochinchina and later in Tonkin who sponsored Mr. Nguyen Van Vinh in the printing and journalism profession, was for a time located on the ground floor of the Continental Hotel. The lower floor and sidewalk overlooking the theater and theater square were coffee houses, meeting places for politicians, planters, merchants, civil servants, and middle-class people from the late 19th century until the 1970s. The city's mayor, Paul Blanchy, was a regular visitor during his breaks and meetings with friends.

The 19th-century City Hall and Continental Hotel (top) ; the present-day Continental Hotel (bottom)

When Duke de Montpensier, Ferdinand d'Orleans arrived in Saigon on February 28, 1908 on the ship le Polynesien with a car on the ship l'Annam that had docked in Saigon earlier, Duke Montpensier (the Vietnamese called him Ong Hoang, who built a castle on a hill near Phan Thiet city, which the people called Lau Ong Hoang) planned to go by car from Saigon to Angkor first. He successfully made the trip to Angkor by car in 1908 and wrote a book published 2 years later titled La ville au bois dormant: de Saigon à Angkor en automobile (The Sleeping City in the Forest: from Saigon to Angkor by Car) , based on the fairy tale La Belle au bois dormant (The Sleeping Beauty in the Forest) by Charles Perrault. During his time in Saigon, Mr. Hoang stayed at the Continental Hotel and later bought this hotel. The trip to Angkor from Saigon departed from the Continental Hotel. In 1933, the Duke of Montpensier sold the Continental Hotel to Mathieu Franchini, a Frenchman of Corsican origin. Franchini had a Vietnamese wife, the daughter of a wealthy landowner, who helped him buy the Continental Hotel from Prince Montpensier. Since Mathieu Franchini became the owner of the Continental Hotel, the Corsican Association of Saigon regularly met and met with Corsicans. His son, Philippe Franchini, took over the management of the Continental Hotel until 1975.

Diétrich car of the Lorraine-Dietrich company that Mr. Hoang Montpensier drove to Angkor in 1908 (Source: Ferdinand-François d'Orléans, duc de Montpensier, La ville au bois dormant: de Saïgon à Angkor en automobile, Plon, Nourrit et Cie (Paris), 1910, Bibliothèque Nationale de France)

The square in front of the City Theater and the Continental Hotel is called the Theater Square (Place de théâtre). Previously, it was also called Francis Garnier Square (there was a statue of Garnier in the square). In 1945, after the Japanese surrender, in the early days of the August Revolution in Saigon, the statue of Francis Garnier and the statue of Admiral Rigault de Genouilly in the Place de Genouilly (Me Linh) were removed. Since the Republic of Vietnam, the Theater Square has been called Lam Son Square and remains so to this day. At the corner of Dong Khoi and Le Loi streets, in front of the City Theater, opposite the Continental Hotel, from the 1960s until 2010 was the Givral cafe and restaurant, an elegant meeting place for Saigonese when they had the opportunity to go to the center of Saigon after walking on Le Loi, Catinat (Tu Do, Dong Khoi), Nguyen Hue streets or around the Saigon market. In this place as shown in the picture (above), in the early 20th century was the famous cafe "Café de la musique" of Mr. Pancrazi and later the pharmacy Pharmacie Solirène. Source: https://thanhnien.vn/kien-truc-do-thi-va-canh-quan-sai-gon-cho-lon-xua-va-nay-toa-nha-thi-sanh-khach-san-continental-185240716212324704.htm